Last month, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization released a food security and nutrition report which says the number of people facing hunger globally has declined for the third consecutive year, but Africa still has the highest number of people with insufficient food. CHARLES MPAKA spoke on the phone with Ange-David Baïmey, a researcher at GRAIN, an international non-profit that advocates for smallholder farmers, about some of the messages in the report.
What explains why Africa’s progress in reducing hunger is lagging behind other regions’?
The issue of hunger in Africa is related to our different national policies. For example, if we go some years back, we heard that every African country in the framework of Maputo Protocol was required to put 10% [of their budget] in the agriculture sector. But some of the results did not happen. Countries did not reach the 10%. So, first of all, we have our different national policies, you know, that did not put a lot of emphasis on small-scale agriculture rather than putting a lot of money on large-scale investment.
If you look at some countries like Ivory Coast or Liberia, where more than 30,000 hectares or 15,000 hectares can be given to a foreign company to do rubber or to do oil plantations, [yet] it is clear that the issue of hunger is related to cassava, potato. All the food sovereignty aspects cannot be reached. So, the issue of hunger is related to bad policy, bad agriculture policy our governments in Africa are taking.
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What needs to change in the production and distribution of food for this situation in Africa to improve?
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So, if we want to improve production and distribution, maybe the first thing we have to do is to put the farmers, the small-scale farmers, in the centre of our policy. You cannot continue to believe that large-scale agriculture will feed Africa. No, this is not true, you know. We need to help our small-scale farmers to get access to land, to secure the land in the way that that land cannot be grabbed by multinational companies coming to do food for exportation. Because a lot of these big, big companies are just coming to take control of the land to produce and it is for exportation. So, first of all, we have to help our farmers, our small-scale farmers to produce, to get access to land, to get access to water, to get access to seed.
And when I talk about seed, I think that we cannot continue to live in the country where it is difficult for farmers to share seed and all the farmers have to rely on, you know, is imported seed or hybrid seed. That is very damaging to our agriculture in Africa.
How do climate, land and ecological factors influence food security in Africa?
Yes, climate is very key, you know. Today, if you take, for example, some countries like Ivory Coast, we are in rainy season, but that is not enough, because you can see in some places there’s drought. So, this is very key, and for me, we have to emphasize on agroecological methods.
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We have a lot of agroecological methods that need to be, you know, supported by national policy to help farmers to deal against climate change, because climate change is the more critical threat on our farmers, our agriculture. We need to help farmers, for example, putting more emphasis on how they can get support from the government, not from private company, not from carbon market, but get support so that they can do organic agriculture.
If we don’t put emphasis on agroecological methods, it will be very difficult to deal with climate change. That is the way. It is not that we need to go climate smart. Not the climate smart way as seen by government. We need to take control of the seed, take control of the land, because we cannot accept, for example, that today people are willing to invest in GMO rather than support organic fertilizer, organic method of farming. That is not acceptable.
How should African countries respond to the global developments affecting food production on the continent?
We need to go to a national policy that will be in the favour of the small-scale farmers. As I said, we need to fight against land grabbing. We need to fight against the control of our seed from the industrial sector. We need to deal with the issue of water. We need to fight against carbon market because in the name of climate today, lot of land is falling under the control of a company that want to do eucalyptus plantation, rubber plantation, palm plantation, just to sell carbon in the international market.
In the name of fighting against climate change, we see a lot of land grabbing coming, a lot of water control, water grabbing. So we need to deal with that kind of thing with national policies that put the small-scale farmers in the centre. That is one of the most important thing to do.
(The interview has been slightly edited for clarity and length)
ANGE-DAVID BAÏMEY: RESEARCHER AT GRAIN
BAÏMEY—We need to take control of the seed, take control of the land
