Monday, May 5, 2008

The Issue of Africa

Is the continent as hopeless as the bleak image presented in the SG’s report, or is there perhaps more to it? Nnimmo Bassey takes a stab at dissecting his continent before the CSD sinks its teeth in.

When images of hunger are needed, the media do not look anywhere but Africa. When pictures of poverty are needed, Africa is the destination to satisfy that need. When disease, violence, economic stagnation and governance problems are being dissected, Africa is a gold mine for illustrations. To crown it all, Africa has turned up as the first continent to be made a special issue at the CSD.

The branding of Africa as a chronically hungry, disaster prone and conflict ridden continent demands that something should be done about this troublesome and troubling continent. For this reason, Africa has become a test ground for all sorts of ideas, exploitations and “investments”. More workshops and talk-shops are held on the African situation outside of Africa than actually on the continent. You can become an expert on Africa at the drop of a hat. Agents of states, corporations and other strong powers can suggest and impose a fix at a moment’s notice.

Will the discussion of Africa at the CSD elicit paternalistic pontifications? Will the CSD reinforce those ubiquitous pictures of kids with distended bellies, extended hands, gaping mouths, empty eyes and empty bowls? Will the chambers of the UN ring and echo with the question: what can be done to feed these hungry Africans?

Missed the train?

It is not surprising that alliances are being forged ostensibly to address the perceived problems of the continent. Today we hear of alliances such as the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) as well as the Business Alliance Against Chronic Hunger. While AGRA is sponsored by the Rockefeller and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Business Alliance Against Chronic Hunger is made up of the food giant Unilever, sportswear manufacturer Nike and express delivery firm TNT (More must be in the wings). These two alliances seek to bring about a Green Revolution in Africa and their inspiration is the “increased agricultural production observed in Mexico and India between the 1940s and 1960s”. The often paraded idea is that Africa missed the first Green Revolution train and must not miss the train this time around. But someone once said that it is not always such a bad thing to have missed a train, especially when no one knows if the train ever got to its destination.

Silver bullet solutions

Everyone agrees that African agricultural production must be enhanced. The point of disagreement is how this should be done. A lot of investment is being made by organisations and institutions with vested interest to build weak biosafety regulatory frameworks across the continent, with the aim of opening the African continent to contamination and depletion of genetic resources, and of colonising the continent through control of seeds and food chains.

The industry claims that modern crop biotechnology holds the silver bullet to solve all African agricultural problems. AGRA has equivocated on this subject. Genetically engineered crops allegedly require less herbicide and pesticides; give higher yields than ‘conventional’ crops and are the solution to the hunger question. All these have been shown to be false claims, documented in publications such as the Friends of the Earth International’s report Who Benefits from GMOs? That GE crops do not yield better than conventional crops has been attested to in studies conducted by the United States Department of Agriculture.

Subtle yet clear suggestions from the SG

The arguments still persist. The report of the Secretary-General on Africa for CSD-16, for example, says in paragraph 52 “African soils are diverse but characterized by limited fertility. Only 45 per cent of the lands are arable, 16 per cent has soil of high quality and about 13 per cent has soil of medium quality. Likewise, new high-yielding crop varieties are scarce, though the diffusion of available ones has begun to accelerate. Genetically modified crops are currently grown commercially only in South Africa.”

There is a subtle but clear attempt to suggest here that GM crops would provide a solution if widely planted in Africa. It is problematic for the Secretary General to make such a suggestion at a time when it is evident that after more than a decade of GM crops they have failed on every count to deliver on the promises made by the industry.

The current food crisis has shown clearly that people are not usually hungry because of a lack of food but because of the lack of access to food. In an article in Nigeria’s Vanguard newspaper on 02 May 2008, labour activist and commentator Owei Lakemfa noted that the year Bangladesh had a bumper harvest was the same year that the country experienced a severe food crisis that cost over a million lives.

Not so free market

The factors that make available food inaccessible to vast numbers of people can also be tracked in the matrix that affects agricultural production and delivery of products. The top of the list is the well-orchestrated neoliberal policies that preach free market philosophies while the supposed market forces are only allowed to operate selectively. Africa has experienced wholesale alteration of beneficial agricultural policies because of wrong-headed stipulations of international financial institutions such as the IMF and World Bank through their so-called structural adjustment programmes (SAP). While European and USA governments subsidise their farmers and create favourable conditions to aid production, African governments are debarred from taking such steps. Trade rules and agreements are set up to destabilise already weakened economies and open them to dependency on aid and other acts of benevolence from the same systems that crippled them. Another truth is that food aid is not free food. It is big business.

Devastating impacts

Examples of how these policies have played out on African agriculture can be seen in the examples of Cameroon, Senegal and Ghana. Lowering tariff protection to 25% in Cameroon saw poultry imports increase by about six-fold. In Senegal, 70 percent of the poultry industry has been wiped out in recent years because of EU’s domestic poultry policy in support of their local poultry farmers.

Rice imports doubled in Ghana when the nation reduced its rice tariffs from 100 to 20 percent as a result of the structural adjustment policies enforced by the World Bank. Domestic rice accounted for 43 percent of the domestic market in 2000 but only managed to capture 29 percent of the domestic market in 2003. Rice imports increased from 250,000 tonnes in 1998 to 415,150 tonnes in 2003. It is also reported that 66 percent of rice producers recorded negative returns, leading to loss of employment. With regard to tomato paste, imports from the EU increased by 650 % from 3,300 tons in 1998 to 24,740 tons in 2003 with farmers losing 40 % of the share of the domestic market besides lowered local prices.

Time for frank conversation

After all has been said, having placed Africa on the CSD dissecting slab, it is important for us to see an opportunity for a frank discourse. It is time for all to note that the perpetuation of Africa (through odious debts and other mechanisms) as a perpetual source of raw materials and as a continent that is continually exploited to satisfy wanton consumption in the West will not help mankind in the long run. We are holding Africa to the mirror, but it is our collective faces that are being reflected. Let us take a frank look at ourselves and ask what part we have played in the dislocations in Africa; what part we can play in her liberation. Charity is not the solution. The continent has paid her dues to build the world. It is now time to requite her for her labours. One way to make this happen is by removing the yoke of unjust debt, uneven trade rules and unhealthy economic policies off her neck.