11:56 GMT 31st August 2011
The image of starving Africa children used by western charities to promote fund raising campaigns is not only disrurbing but also humiliating to the collective psyche of African people. Much has been made of the effect of drought and climate change. The truth is that these are merely lame excuses to cover up the incompetence of African governments.
The drought occurs in a recurring cycle of 10 years so any government worth its name has ample time to prepare for it. Climate change is not only affecting Africa but also other parts of the world, and the images of starving children from those parts do not stare out from global TV screens.
The blame for Africa's inability to feed itself lies at the doorsteps of its governments. In the 1970s, Africa did not have a hunger problem despite the continent not being as developed as it is today. This was because governments then had the commonsense to realise that food security comes before all other forms of security. Agricultural inputs like fertiliser were subsidised and most countries had agricultural extension officers who supported rural farmers.
Then in the 1980s, the IMF-inspired economic reforms swept through most of Africa. At a time that Europe and the US were subsidising their farmers, the IMF recommended that African countries, among many other public spending cuts, withdraw their agricultural subsidies. African leaders swallowed the medicine in order to receive IMF aid. As a result, cultivating food became uncompetitive against imports from highly subsidised agricultural economies outside of Africa. At the same time, African countries were encouraged to grow cash crops for export. While this boosted foreign exchange inflows, it left African countries poorer because some of it went on food imports.
At the same time, the governments were asked to close down agricultural marketing boards, which guaranteed the prices of agricultural products and acted as insurance against losses to farmers. This they did. Rather than invest in food production, Africa divested.
With farming becoming unattractive, youngsters migrated from rural areas to the urban centres in search of jobs, which were not necessarily available. Parts of the continent started suffering a double calamity: the lands were no longer being farmed and the erstwhile farmers were now unproductive. This means Africa could not increase its food productivity at the same rate as its fast growing population.
An FAO study says while cereals output in southern Africa grew by just three per cent between 1980 and 2001, the population grew by 34 per cent. This was a mismatch that could have challenged governments elsewhere to take action, but not in Africa. Our leaders took the easy route and grew dependent on food aid to the extent that East Africa with just 3.6 per cent of the world's population consumed 20 per cent of global food aid.
The continent's leaders have to develop strategies to guarantee that never again will our children go hungry or beg for food. Agricultural subsidies should be re-introduced, commodity boards brought back and rural infrastructure improved. If the Israelis can turn stretches of the desert into agricultural farmlands, then Africans can defeat drought. Our forebears never received food aid and never starved.
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