Posts Tagged ‘Africa’
|Africa: Agro imperialism’s final frontier?
Saturday, November 21st, 2009
In an article titled, “Is There Such a Thing as Agro-Imperialism?” in the NY Times Sunday Magazine, Andrew Rice writes about how wealthy nations are now staking out land in the developing world—notably Africa—in order to feed their own future populations. Let me say up front that if increasing foreign investment in domestic agriculture can pull African nations out of poverty, then it’s worth a serious look.
However, there’s a related issue that’s worth noting: Sooner or later, the combination of (1) rising populations, (2) higher per-capita meat consumption, and (3) possible shifts to more sustainable meat production (pasture fed)—with its attendant land requirements and higher costs—will likely force the developed world to export more of its own food production to the developing world, where land and labor are cheap.
This could lead to potentially large ecological damage if the modern industrialized agricultural model—rather than sustainable modes of production— is also exported.
There are several conversations that need to happen:
- Who benefits from foreign cash flows, especially in countries with abysmal records of transparency, corrupt governments, and land tenure rights? It’s not clear it will be the farmers.
- Should the developed world reduce its meat consumption to accommodate higher-yielding agriculture within its own geographic borders before it turns to the developing world—who has difficulty feeding its own people— for help.
- Is this even feasible in food-insecure nations? As stated in the article, “The idea that one country would go to another country…and lease some land, and expect that the rice produced there would be made available to them if there’s a food crisis in that host country, is ludicrous.”
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Tags: Africa
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