The Continental Food Security Summit vows to rally new farming tactics, enhance inter-trade and seek to cut $50bn of imports each year on food it could produce.
IMANI LWINGA
A vital continental agricultural forum hosted by Tanzania’s commercial capital of Dar es Salaam has brought in a new dawn for the despaired youth, ultimately, putting in place some effective approaches on food security. After all, it’s no doubt Africa, a continent of immense potential, stands at a crucial stage.
Home to some of the world’s most fertile lands, abundant resources, and a growing young population, Africa remains illogically trapped in the grip of food insecurity and malnutrition. The continent is also devastated by challenges such as climate change, post-harvest losses, and inefficient supply chains. That being the case, the urgency to empower and transform African food systems is not merely an agricultural or economic imperious but a moral, social, and ecological one.
Dubbed ‘Recover, Regenerate, Act: Africa’s Solutions to Food Systems Transformation’ the Dar es Salaam event brought together over 5,000 delegates, leaders, and innovators from across the globe in discussions around policy breakthroughs and innovation in agriculture and food systems revolution in the entire continent Africa.
“Tanzania as the host of this forum announces to the world that our country aims to become a food granary for Africa and the world in general,” President Dr. Samia was quoted as saying prior to the kick-off of the 13th annual Africa Food Systems Forum (AGRF), convened from September 5-8, 2023, under her leadership at the iconic Julius Nyerere International Convention Centre (JNICC) in the heart of the city.
The AGRF [Africa Green Revolution Forum] is the world’s premier forum for African agriculture, bringing together stakeholders in the agricultural landscape to take practical actions and share lessons that will move African agriculture forward.
Dr. Samia underscores the importance of the summit to her nation where more than 25 percent of GDP relies on the agricultural sector. For many years, the president says, Tanzania’s agriculture was based on subsistence farming, adding that today, the country has made it a goal to prioritize agriculture in order to create livelihoods for her people.
Tanzania has already embarked on addressing food security and job creation through the “Building a Better Tomorrow: Youth Initiative for Agribusiness (BBT-YIA),” which aims to provide agribusiness training to 200,000 youth, and support to 15,000 youth-led agribusiness ventures in Tanzanian villages over the next five years.
“This year’s summit places a strong emphasis on empowering women and youth, recognizing their pivotal roles in reshaping Africa’s food landscape,” says Hussein Bashe, Tanzania’s Minister of Agriculture. The Forum represents a significant milestone in the journey towards inclusive and sustainable food systems transformation throughout the continent.
This is echoed by Dr. William Ruto, Kenya’s President as he addressed the Forum in Dar es Salaam: “There is no future in agriculture, unless we bring our young people on board. It’s through agriculture, where we will create young billionaires in Africa. We have greatest potential in agriculture space on the continent.”
Amath Pathe Sene, the Managing Director of the Africa Food Systems Forum, underlines the pressing need for leadership and inclusion in tackling the continent’s food system challenges. “It is imperative that we make our voices heard, develop solutions that are rooted in our local context, and give paramount importance to the empowerment of women and youth in the process of transforming our food systems,” he says.
What does food system encompass
The notion of a food system mull over the governance, economics, social and cultural shares of food. This includes the resources and processes involved in producing food, the actors and relationships involved in food production and consumption, and the outcomes of these activities including nutritional status, socioeconomic growth, and environmental sustainability.
A food system failure therefore implies a significant dysfunction at any or multiple stages of this chain that can disrupt the ability of the system to adequately provide food to the population. One of the first signs of a food system failure is insufficient food production. This could be due to a variety of factors such as poor agricultural practices, soil degradation, water scarcity, or extreme weather events related to climate change.
“Even when enough food is produced, failure in the distribution system can prevent it from reaching the people who need it,” cites John M. Ulimwengu and Nick Blumenthal. “Moreover, food may be physically available but not affordable to some segments of the population,” they assert in their recent report titled “Assessing Structural Failure of African Food Systems.’
According to the report, high levels of food waste and loss, either post-harvest or at the consumer level, can also indicate a failure of the food system. Globally, about one-third of food produced is wasted, which speaks to systemic inefficiencies. If a food system leads to widespread negative health outcomes such as obesity and malnutrition, or contributes significantly to environmental degradation, it could be considered failing, according to 2020 Global Nutrition Report.
A food system’s inability to withstand shocks, such as pandemics, economic crises, or climate-related disasters, and provide a stable supply of nutritious food can also be seen as a failure. In many African countries, food system failures lead to conflicts, particularly over scarce resources. Recognizing these failures can contribute to conflict prevention and peacebuilding efforts.
Hailemariam Dessalegn, former Ethiopian Prime Minister stresses on the difference between the Africa we seek to see and the Africa we shall become by 2060.
“…(Africa) is all dependent on the decisions we as leaders make and the supporting infrastructure, investments and policies in transforming food systems to produce sufficient, nutritious food in the changing social, political and climatic conditions,” says Dessalegn, the Chair of the Africa Food Systems Forum.
The consequence of Russia-Ukraine conflict
Nonetheless, it is important to acknowledge that Russia-Ukraine crisis cannot be looked at in isolation from the climate crisis when looking at the issue of food security in Africa. It’s a big wake-up call for many African governments, particularly, the huge importance of investing in soils. Africa has not had so many hungry people and the cost-of-living crisis is impacting everyone.
“How many people really knew that the wheat we had in our homes came from Russia or Ukraine? What the combined impact of COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine did was expose the weaknesses of global supply chains and our dependencies,” says Dr. Agness Kalibata, President of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), an organisation that seeks to transform African agriculture from a subsistence model to strong businesses that improve the livelihoods of the continent’s farming households.
Many of the value chains and trade systems on which Africa relied have been thrown into question, she says, adding that every dark cloud has a silver lining and Africa is waking up to its potential and the need to produce more food as a result of these crises.
For his part, the President of Tanzania’s archipelago island of Zanzibar, Dr. Hussein Ali Mwinyi underscores the need for Africa to stand firm to cope with various challenges associated with agriculture and food systems.
“Africa must stand firm in strengthening innovation, technology, capital, infrastructure and investment in agriculture and food systems to cope with the challenges,” Dr. Mwinyi says as he addresses the Forum.
How much Africa spend on food imports
Currently, Africa imports $50bn each year of food it could produce locally. Reports suggest that in last two years, Ethiopia has been able to cut its wheat imports by $800mn. African countries have largely treated the agriculture sector as subsistence-based, missing its huge economic and great business future.
“The sector currently generates revenues of $300bn but this could easily triple to become a trillion-dollar industry if we designed it right. For me, the silver lining is that we finally recognize the business opportunity of Africa’s food and agriculture sector,” Dr. Kalibata says, adding:
“Of the $50 billion referred, $18 billion is spent by sub-Saharan Africa to buy four crops that it can produce itself. We need stronger systems and to build resilience into these systems to reduce our exposure to every shock that comes along. When there is a global shock, we’re all shaken out.”
Borders as bridges not barriers for cross-border trade
It’s acknowledged that the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) does give something to build on to increase trade within the continent. Africa right now depends on something like 17% of internal trade as compared with more than 70% elsewhere. Experts suggest that the continent need to catch up and get to 50-60% of intra-African trade.
This is where you see President Ruto calling on African leaders to treat their country’s territorial borders as the bridges for cross-border trade and not barriers. Dr. Ruto uses this opportunity to applaud President Suluhu for swiftly facilitating smooth flow of goods between Kenya and Tanzania. Kenya is a major consumer of Tanzania’s food.
“Border is not a barrier, rather it’s a bridge connecting people of the two countries.” Dr. Ruto says in his address to the summit. Tanzania stands to enjoy an adequate food market available in Kenya and the region due to the fact that she receives large volumes of rainfall as well as its geographical advantage of possessing vast arable land.
What to consider for a successful agriculture
Dr. Kalibata highlights three broad things for the successful agricultural yields. These include an access to technology, which is now mainly sufficient in most countries to advance decent production of food, anchored in higher productivity.
It must be known that the use of advanced technologies such as precision agriculture can increase crop yields and resource efficiency. Innovations such as remote sensing technologies, drones, and artificial intelligent (AI) can help in disease detection, crop monitoring, and optimized irrigation.
Given the increasing threat of climate change, it is essential to promote practices that are resilient to climate change and can also mitigate its effects. This includes techniques like agroforestry, conservation farming, and climate-smart livestock management.
As a result of application of technology, there have been huge increases in efficiency over that time, and food has become a big industry. There are two basic elements to technology – improved seed with much better capabilities to give higher yields, and soil nutrition including availability of the right micronutrients in the soil and whether they are available for plants to use.
Tanzania has embarked on improving seed research facilities for high breed seed germination. This will soon enable the country to be self-sufficient on the much needed high breed seeds. “By 2025, we are eying a three-quarter locally produced seeds needed in Tanzania if not hundred percent. We need certified seeds appropriate to particular soils and the ones that tolerate climatic challenges,” Says President Samia as she addressed a special youth forum on the sidelines of the Summit.
Infrastructure development in terms of irrigation, storage facilities, and transport can significantly reduce post-harvest losses and improve market access for farmers. Strengthening local food markets, for instance through supporting local value chains, promoting agro-processing industries, and improving market information systems, can boost local economies and make them more resilient to shocks.
Promoting sustainable farming practices through organic farming, permaculture, and other practices that improve soil health and biodiversity is also critical. These techniques can increase farmer income as they reduce dependency on expensive imported inputs.
Also, agriculture need a range of other things such as water, and mechanization which help speed things along. According to Dr. Kalibata, all this remains largely inaccessible without a functional “public commons” backbone, of which the most important element is extension.
In most cases, smallholder farmers can’t afford extension on their own, so they need the public commons to provide this service. The other public good include viable market ecosystem, that farmers can plug into as well as infrastructure, going from energy to irrigation to roads.
Dr. Kalibata says “outside of technology and a viable public support system, we need in place the private sector backbone, which is extremely important. If you have these three things growing in tandem – technology, a public commons backbone, and an effective private sector – you will have an increasingly productive agricultural system.”
