gbr@ihuxt.UUCP (gbraymond) (02/15/84)
To add another opinion to the discussion, the following appears in
The Economist, week Feb 13 through Feb 19. It is here without
permission.
Abstract: It tells of the imminent starvation of millions in
Africa due in part to drought and in part to bad planning by local
govts. It proposes that we provide food (and funds?) now to reduce
the effects. It also proposes that money and pressure are needed
to get rid of the practices that led to the bad planning. The
pressure could be applied by letting the countries know that they
would get food only on a selective basis (e.g., only during
drought, not because of mis-management). The author(s) feel that
the combination of available funds and such incentives might
produce the desired self-sufficiency.
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Africa's empty belly
(subtitle:) Help southern Africa with unconditional food aid
now -- but with conditional food aid later
Drought grips southern Africa for the third year in a row. Crops
are failing. Stocks of food are largely exhausted. Unless the
well-fed part of the world moves quickly, many millions of Africans
will go hungry this year and babies will be stunted for the rest of
their lives. Without some cooler and longer-term actions as well,
Africa in the twenty-first century will still be showing the
skeletal arms and overblown bellies that are a fading memory from
the Asia of 20 years ago.
The quick response should be the easiest part. Every country in
southern Africa will have to import food this year. Only South
Africa -- where the maize crop will be ruined unless heavy rains
come within 10 days -- has the foreign exchange to buy what it
needs. The others will either be given food as aid or go short.
The United States announced last week that it is providing an extra
$600m of food over five years to the whole of Africa.
That is a start. But it will cost at least $145m this year alone
to provide the food that southern Africa can neither grow nor
afford to import. Speed is essential: the United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) believes that the biggest failing of
emergency food aid is that it is announced too late, so that
drought-struck countries have no time to prepare transport and
distribution.
A prompt response from the world's rich countries will stop people
going hungry this year. But food aid can help only in natural
disasters; at other times, it weakens Africa's ability and
determination to feed itself. Given reasonable weather, what
African countries need are better policies -- not only for growing
more food but for distributing it as well. These policies include
higher prices for farmers, competitive exchange rates, more
emphasis on agricultural advice, ending the monopoly of inefficient
para-statal bodies for supplying farmers with seeds and fertilizer
and for marketing their crops. Other countries can press for these
changes through international bodies like FAO and the World Bank.
But nothing will improve unless the policies are adopted by African
governments. They are more likely to do so if the rich world gets
tougher -- by, for instance, saying that from now on it will decide
every year whether the weather justifies food aid: no drought, no
aid.
Two other improvements could be pushed more directly. Agricultural
R&D needs to be boosted in Africa, to raise crop yields and
strengthen resistance to disease and erratic rainfall. Africa has
yet to have its own Green Revolution -- those new seeds that, mixed
with the right amount of water and fertilizer, have transformed
farming in Asia and Latin America. It is much harder to green the
farming in drier parts of the world, of course, but that is a bad
reason for not trying.
The big agricultural advances in Asia and Latin America came in the
1960s and 1970s; Africa has lagged behind. Take the example of
Zimbabwe which, until this year, has never had to import maize.
Its basic breed of maize was developed in 1952, and has hardly
changed since then.
Africa and its well-wishers cannot rely on the international
research centers to upgrade its farming: their work bears fattest
fruit when it is adapted to local conditions. As a proportion of
their farming output, African countries spend less than half what
industrial countries do on agricultural R&D; given farming's much
bigger weight in their economies, they ought to be spending about
twice the industrial world's average.
The other area for international action is to help Africa finance
stocks of food that it builds up itself. At a time of empty
shelves this may sound academic; but agricultural progress springs
from the right long-term incentives. The International Monetary
Fund already helps countries in balance-of-payments difficulties to
finance buffer stocks that are part of international commodity
agreements. The IMF or the African Development Bank could do the
same for countries holding their own food stocks, giving a new and
more lasting meaning to the notion of food aid.saquigley@watmath.UUCP (Sophie Quigley) (02/17/84)
ARGGHH!!! The wonders of the "green revolution" are brought upon us once more. May I suggest a book entitled "Seeds of the Earth, a private or public resource" by Pat Roy Mooney. This book is available from Inter-Pares whose address I will provide if anybody is interested. It deals with the political and environmental issues related to such controversial agricultural policies as the "green revolution", plant breeding, germplasm conservation. A must for people who like to worry about where this planet is headed. My own personal subtitle for this book is "how I learned to stop worrying about the bomb, and started worrying about seeds instead". Sophie Quigley watmath!saquigley