'Africa can feed the world' | Mark Tran

Kanayo Nwanze in a visit to China last week. At the Conference of FAO in Rome, said that Africa could repeat the success of farmers in China, which also suffered frequent droughts. Photography: Park Ji-Hwan/AFP/Getty Images

Africa can feed not only himself, but the world is a bold statement to make at a time when famine looming over part of the continent.

But this is precisely the demand made by Kanayo Nwanze, President of the International Fund for agricultural development (IFAD), a specialized agency of the United Nations. Nwanze gave a forceful intervention in emergency meeting on Monday in Rome to discuss the crisis in East Africa, where, according to the UN, some 11.6 million people need humanitarian assistance in Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti.

Nwanze drew a sharp contrast between Gansu province in Northwestern China and parts of Africa who can not feed. He said as many parts of the world, Gansu suffers from frequent droughts, limited water for irrigation and severe erosion. Even though the climate and the harsh environment, the programme area of Gansu farmers are feeding and increase their income.

"I met a farmer whose incomes have risen only 2 (￡ 1.20) per day in 2006 to $35 a day last year", he exclaimed.

So when asked why this could be done in China but not in Africa, Nwanze said the vital difference political era of the Government.

"What I saw in Gansu was the result of the policy of the Government to invest in rural areas and reduce the gap between the rural and the urban and curb the migration," said in a telephone interview. "You have a very hard environment, it has only 300 millimeters of rain a year, compared to the Sahel to get 400-600 mm, but the Government has invested in roads and electricity." We are a community ready to transform their lives for rainwater harvesting, using biogas, slopes terraces in the mountains. "There are cultures, earned, are vegetables, wheat and maize cultivation and income generation that allow you to build resistance."

While Somalia is a worse, still Nwanze, Ethiopia and Djibouti has been a lack of investment in the long term which makes them vulnerable to climate change. "Not enough to wait for disaster to act crisis." The rains will fail again, but Governments have not invested in the capacity of populations to resist drought.

Nwanze argues that Africa is facing the consequences of decades of neglecting agriculture, a fault found with aid donors and African Governments.

"There was a change in the paradigm of the agriculture industrialization," he said. "Is good, but not to the extent that neglect food and now face the consequences." Even where farming practices has been seen as the occupation of a poor man. "It is not as an attractive profession."

The figures backup you. In the mid 1990s, ODA for global development to agriculture reached $20 billion before decline to $endowed in a early 2000. It is slow upward again, reaching $9bn in 2009. In a recent report, one advocacy group, gave two reasons for the decline: complacency for food production in the world after the dramatic improvement in the production of food in Asia and Latin America and the doctrine of development stressed developing countries dismantle State and State enterprises including agricultural research during the 1960s and 1970s.

But after decades of neglect, agriculture is fashionable again in development circles. Posts by the increase in food prices worldwide in 2009, the g-8 group of rich countries and other donors committed to provide $22bn of funds for agriculture and food security. Donors have some ground to fulfill those promises in the agreed deadline of three years, but agriculture is firmly on the international agenda. In June, Ministers of Agriculture of the G20 agreed to a plan of action in Paris, which reiterated their commitment to the promise of 2009 L'Aquila and cited the importance of small farmers.

Nwanze, who welcomed the plan of Action considers that small farmers as the great hope of Africa. Agriculture, mainly on a small scale, represents approximately 30% of the GDP and at least 40% of the value of exports from sub-Saharan Africa. In a number of small countries in Africa, agriculture plays a more important role, representing 80 per cent or more of export earnings.

The President of IFAD said that Africa could easily increase the use of fertiliser without impact on the environment, because the current usage is so low. And cited the possibility of increasing irrigation: only 7% of the land in Africa is irrigated, compared with more than 30% of the land in Asia and the possibilities of farmers using improved seed varieties which would considerably increase the productivity.

If this sounds circular in the sky, Nwanze cites a number of countries that are experiencing success focusing on agriculture, Tanzania, Rwanda and Ghana - whose Governments, assisted by the private sector, have made a great commitment to agriculture. "The potential is enormous, said Nwanze.""With a small investment, Africa can feed and has the potential to feed the world".

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