With over 800 million people worldwide suffering from hunger and more than two billion affected by malnutrition, food insecurity remains a real threat to global development, says the African Development Bank (ADB)
Addressing global agriculture experts at the FAO headquarters in Rome, 2017 World Food Prize Laureate and President of the African Development Bank, Akinwumi Adesina, says the answer is a resounding yes!
He believes Africa does not need aid, but disciplined investments. He believes the time has come to view investment and development opportunities in Africa through a totally different lens.
Adesina, who is making a global pitch for renewed visionary leadership and strategic alliances, is of the opinion that ‘the future of food in the world will depend on what Africa does with agriculture.’
The African Development Bank envisions a food secure continent which uses advanced technologies, creatively adapts to climate change, and develops a whole new generation of what he describes as ‘agri-preneurs’ – empowered youth and women who he expects to take agriculture to the next level.
By 2050, an additional 38 million Africans will be hungry. The paradox of lack in the midst of plenty, and Africa’s growing youth bulge are some of the reasons why Adesina’s sense of urgency is resonating with numerous government, private sector, and multilateral leaders during recent European and Asian trips.
Africa continues to import what it should be producing, spending $35 billion on food imports each year, a figure that is expected to rise to $110 billion in 2025 if present trends continue.
A few days later, Adesina joined Rockefeller Foundation President Raj Shah, Unilever CEO Paul Polman, and 2018 World Food Prize nominees Lawrence Haddad and David Navarro, among other prominent global academic, development, and agriculture experts at Wageningen University and Research, in the Netherlands, to make the case for urgent collective action by State and non-State players to accelerate Africa’s agricultural growth and transformation.
Adesina told his audience that ‘adding value to what nations produce, is the secret to their wealth.’ Africa receives only two percent of the $100 billion annual revenues from chocolates globally. ‘Producing chocolate instead of simply exporting cocoa beans does not require rocket science.’
To expand opportunities for youth, women, and private sector players, Adesina is on a global mission to promote and seek support for the bank’s Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA) programme, which aims to mobilise $3 billion to support women entrepreneurs who historically lack access to finance, land, and land titles; a $300 million ENABLE Youth programme, to develop the next generation of agribusiness and commercial farmers for Africa; and a new global investment marketplace, the African Investment Forum, which will be held in Johannesburg on 7 -9 November.
In separate meetings with Sigrid AM Kaag (Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation, in the Hague), Peter van Mierlo (CEO of the Dutch Entrepreneurial Development Bank (FMO)), key private sector players, and members of the Dutch Foreign Affairs Advisory Council, Adesina said Africa and its partners must seize unprecedented opportunities for innovative partnerships and increased development impact.
Mierlo believes ‘a huge benefit for Africa is that it can skip development cycles that often almost all developed countries had to go through, by deploying new technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotics in agriculture’. In a continent where more than 640 million are without electricity, Adesina said that the private sector is key to Africa’s development in Africa’s energy and agriculture sectors.
‘If Africa is going to turn the tide of irregular migration, this is critical. There are three ways in which we can collaborate: either through the NEPAD Infrastructure Project Preparation Facility, Africa 50 – a private equity institution which has raised more than US$ 850 million from 22 countries, and the new Africa Investment Forum.’
Adesina recognises that the lack of electricity is Africa’s biggest development impediment. The Bank’s new and ambitious Desert-to-Power initiative, which aims to generate 10 000 MW of power across Africa’s Sahel region, will be critical to reducing migration and climate change impacts. We will do this through a blended finance mechanism with guarantees,’ Adesina said.
Speaking to a high-level Roundtable of Dutch business leaders at the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO), informed key private sector leaders; governance structures and business regulatory environments are changing in Africa. Indeed, several African countries have already made significant progress in improving their general business and investment environments. Africa is doing better than some of the Asian countries,’ he pointed out to his audience. ‘In the energy sector, the African Development Bank is investing $12 billion over the next five years, with the goal of leveraging $40 to 50 billion; and an additional $24 billion, over ten years, in agriculture to implement its Feed Africa Strategy’.
Agriculture steadily taking centre stage
The strategy is already bearing fruit with the establishment of Staple Crop Processing Zones in several African countries, including Ethiopia, Togo, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Mozambique, with a plan to reach 15 countries in a few years.
Strategically located in and around rural farming communities, Adesina says ‘these agriculture zones will form the nucleus of a new wave of agro-industries and greenfield ventures, attracting agri-preneurs, bio technology firms, intellectual and capital investments. It will also ensure that foods are processed and packaged right where they are produced, rather than in urban centres far removed from centres of production.
Article republished with the kind permission of Afgriland
Afgriland Nov/Dec 2018
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
__hssrc | session | This cookie is set by Hubspot. According to their documentation, whenever HubSpot changes the session cookie, this cookie is also set to determine if the visitor has restarted their browser. If this cookie does not exist when HubSpot manages cookies, it is considered a new session. |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-advertisement | 1 year | The cookie is set to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Advertisement". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics | 11 months | This cookie is set to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional | 11 months | The cookie is set to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary | 11 months | This cookie is set to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others | 11 months | This cookie is set to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other. |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance | 11 months | This cookie is set to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". |
viewed_cookie_policy | 11 months | The cookie is set to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. |
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
__hssc | 30 minutes | This cookie is set by HubSpot. The purpose of the cookie is to keep track of sessions. This is used to determine if HubSpot should increment the session number and timestamps in the __hstc cookie. It contains the domain, viewCount (increments each pageView in a session), and session start timestamp. |
bcookie | 2 years | This cookie is set by linkedIn. The purpose of the cookie is to enable LinkedIn functionalities on the page. |
lang | session | This cookie is used to store the language preferences of a user to serve up content in that stored language the next time user visit the website. |
lidc | 1 day | This cookie is set by LinkedIn and used for routing. |
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
__hstc | 1 year 24 days | This cookie is set by Hubspot and is used for tracking visitors. It contains the domain, utk, initial timestamp (first visit), last timestamp (last visit), current timestamp (this visit), and session number (increments for each subsequent session). |
_ga | 2 years | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookies store information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors. |
_ga_7830NTLLXS | 2 years | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. |
_ga_8FT0WQ6XG7 | 2 years | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. |
_gat_UA-199321007-1 | 1 minute | This is a pattern type cookie set by Google Analytics, where the pattern element on the name contains the unique identity number of the account or website it relates to. It appears to be a variation of the _gat cookie which is used to limit the amount of data recorded by Google on high traffic volume websites. |
_gcl_au | 3 months | This cookie is used by Google Analytics to understand user interaction with the website. |
_gid | 1 day | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to store information of how visitors use a website and helps in creating an analytics report of how the website is doing. The data collected including the number visitors, the source where they have come from, and the pages visted in an anonymous form. |
hubspotutk | 1 year 24 days | This cookie is used by HubSpot to keep track of the visitors to the website. This cookie is passed to Hubspot on form submission and used when deduplicating contacts. |
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
_fbp | 3 months | This cookie is set by Facebook to deliver advertisement when they are on Facebook or a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising after visiting this website. |
bscookie | 2 years | This cookie is a browser ID cookie set by Linked share Buttons and ad tags. |
fr | 3 months | The cookie is set by Facebook to show relevant advertisments to the users and measure and improve the advertisements. The cookie also tracks the behavior of the user across the web on sites that have Facebook pixel or Facebook social plugin. |
IDE | 1 year 24 days | Used by Google DoubleClick and stores information about how the user uses the website and any other advertisement before visiting the website. This is used to present users with ads that are relevant to them according to the user profile. |
test_cookie | 15 minutes | This cookie is set by doubleclick.net. The purpose of the cookie is to determine if the user's browser supports cookies. |
VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE | 5 months 27 days | This cookie is set by Youtube. Used to track the information of the embedded YouTube videos on a website. |
YSC | session | This cookies is set by Youtube and is used to track the views of embedded videos. |
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
AnalyticsSyncHistory | 1 month | No description |
CONSENT | 16 years 6 months 1 day 12 hours | No description |
li_gc | 2 years | No description |
UserMatchHistory | 1 month | Linkedin - Used to track visitors on multiple websites, in order to present relevant advertisement based on the visitor's preferences. |
yt-remote-connected-devices | never | No description available. |
yt-remote-device-id | never | No description available. |