A Hunger-Free Africa

ERADICATING hunger and undernourishment in Africa needs to be an African-led effort, but requires the support of international institutions, nonprofit organizations and even multinational corporations. In Sub-Saharan Africa alone, 26.80% for the region’s 873 million population are undernourished¹.

“Africa has the potential to increase its agricultural production given that almost 60% of the arable land in the continent is still not utilised. This enormous potential can make a real difference to improve our agricultural production and food security. It is time to move beyond subsistence agricultural production and consider ways of eventually embarking on agro-industrial production,” said Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, chair of the African Union Commission.

Food security is one of the key priorities of the AUC, which is taking a leadership role at a high-level meeting in Addis Ababa next year – ‘New, unified approaches to end hunger in Africa’ on 4 and 5 March 2013 – with support from the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations and Instituto Lula of Brazil.

Much remains to be done in terms of coordination, allocation and deployment of financial and human resources and strengthening regional and national institutional capacities to address issues such as productivity, climate change and strengthening institutional linkages.

The Challenge of Climate Change
Complex relationships and interactions exist between agriculture and climate change, which remains a major challenge for agriculture and food security in Sub- Saharan Africa. Farmers here, however, have little in the way of strategies and options to mitigate the effects of climate change. At the same time, the massive use of fossil fuels such as coal, natural gas and oil to run the industries that are driving the economies of many African countries, is another factor contributing to climate change and impacting the lives of small stakeholders.

A number of simulations of the impact of changes in agricultural output on Africa’s economic prospects show that from 2010 to 2060, overall economic growth is projected to decline by about 3% each year, solely due to the impact of climate change on agriculture. The decline in economic growth as a result of reduced agricultural output will be of the order of 6% in Southern Africa, 4% in North Africa and 2% in East Africa.²

Any initiative to develop and implement sustainable measures and change st rategies involve a prior understanding of the potential for reduction and absorption of CO2 by agriculture, recommends CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (www.ccafs.cgiar.org/). This requires the production of data and the ability to monitor, measure and assess the levels of carbon emissions in agriculture.

Role of Machinery
Companies i n t h e agricultural machinery supply chain will need to change their business models to meet the growing global demand for food, according to a report from Rabobank FoodAir Max 90 Classic