Africa’s inability to feed itself is a product of both internal and external factors. Some can be explained by history. Africa’s colonizers driven by self interest discouraged diversification in agriculture and emphasized production of single crops. This totally upset traditional agricultural patterns. Gambia, which was known for rice growing, was forced to abandon the crop in favour of peanuts (grown for the European market). This gave rise to famine prompting the country to start importing rice. Tanganyika, on the other hand was forced to grow sisal while Liberia became Firestone Company’s subsidiary to supply rubber. Heavy tax was deliberately imposed on indigenous crops and Livestock consequently forcing Africans to abandon growing traditional crops and work in plantations to pay the tax.

According to Glyvyns Chinkhuntha (Executive Director of Freedom Gardens, Malawi), Africa’s inability to feed itself is a result of misallocation and translocation of the capacities to produce food. “All the capacity building is concentrated in agriculture and agriculturalists while there is not so much capacity in farming and farmers. How do we expect farmers without the capacity to produce all the food they need?” he asks. 

Some scholars attribute food deficiency to soil infertility. Whereas improved varieties have led to increased yields in Asia (by 88 percent), Latin America (66 percent) and middle East (69 percent), there has been only a 28 percent increment in yields in Africa. A total of 132 million tons of nitrogen, 15 million tons of phosphorus and 90 million tons of potassium has been lost from cultivated land in 37 African countries during the last 30 years. Reducing hunger on the continent, stresses Maria Wanzala (NEPAD’s fertilizer adviser) must begin by addressing Africa’s severely depleted soils. 

A recent study conducted by the Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) sheds more light on the hunger issue. According to the report, 24.7 million people in Sub Saharan Africa live with HIV/Aids. This, according o the World Food Program, has a direct impact on food security. For instance, Swaziland’s Minister of Agriculture and Cooperation, Miti Fakudze says that his country is losing a lot of farmers to the epidemic, hence decrease in productivity. Malawi based Victor Mhoni of the Civil Society Agriculture Network (Cisanet) says that in Malawi, the HIV pandemic disrupts labor patterns as a lot of time is spent by laborers tending to the sick thus neglecting farming activities. Mhoni notes that a majority of the people affected by HIV and Aids in Malawi are energetic young people –the very people whom the agricultural sector needs most.  

In spite of all this, there is little mention of Africans’ attitude towards agriculture. They would rather bang spoons against plates in millions as was done in the Stand Up Against Poverty campaign coordinated by the New York based UN Millenium Campaign in October 2006, than get under the load and do the work. Uganda’s President, Yoweri Museveni, once said that “Africans go to school to avoid the soil.” It is not uncommon to hear parents tell their children that if they don’t go to school, they will become farmers. This attitude has led to the underutilization of the factors of production: land, labor and capital. “In Uganda,” complains Museveni, “the whole day is spent on greeting. Why? Time management is not a priority. Where the whole society is operating at a low tempo, everything is relaxed. This is not conducive to productivity.” 

The situation in Kenya’s Kakamega district is reminiscent of the status quo in Nigeria’s Enugu State which loses an average of N530 million to food stock from the North, according to Barrister Ugochukwu Agballah. Though endowed with fertile soils and plenty of rainfall, Kakamega district imports its cabbage and milk from the neighboring Nandi district. Its eggs are imported from Nyanza Province. A farmer would prefer to have cane in his whole farm which will take 18 months to mature, than grow crops which will take a shorter time to mature on rotation. According to Khayega Times, a local monthly magazine, “Most people in western Kenya are professional mourners. They move from one funeral to the other to mourn, neglecting their farms in the process. Besides, they only regard corn meal as food and claim to be hungry if they eat any other food type, say rice.” In some communities of Kenya and Nigeria, funeral rites involve cutting down all crops on the deceased’s farm on the day of burial.  

It’s not a matter of “debt cancellation, more and better aid, fair trade rules” and banging spoons against plates as Stand Up Against Poverty would have us believe. It is investing in making farmers pursue their comparative advantage, perceive agriculture as business, embrace new technologies and providing infrastructure conducive for farming.