Within the last year alone, food crises have devastated millions in sub-Saharan Africa, moving from the Horn of Africa to most recently the Sahel. Despite a decade that broke from a track record of poor policy prescriptions and lagging economic growth, the region has not made parallel progress in addressing food security and nutrition.
According to African Human Development Report 2012: Towards a Food Secure Future, recently released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), economic growth rates were at 6.5 percent between 2004 and 2008. Despite a dip in 2009, growth rebounded to over 5 percent for 2010 and 2011. Examining development indicators, many countries have succeeded in raising expected years of schooling, life expectancy at birth, with sub-Saharan African countries making the greatest improvements in the Human Development Index (HDI) between 2000 and 2011.
However, the story of Africa's battle with food security has been very different. Chronic malnutrition in the region has seen a mere 2 percent drop between 1990 and 2010, and the absolute number of malnourished children has risen within this same period, with 75 percent of these cases in East and West Africa as of 2010.
Compared to Asia, which saw a drop of 25-30 percent in the last decade, sub-Saharan Africa has seen just a 5-10 percent drop in underweight children. Similarly, Africa has seen a less than 5 percent drop in stunting, the primary manifestation of malnutrition in early childhood, with 41.1 percent of children under the age of five affected as of 2010. The report states that unlike in Asia's green revolution, Africa is missing four key ingredients: inputs, technology, trade, and institutions.
Sebastian Levine, economic policy adviser with UNDP's Regional Bureau for Africa, explains to MediaGlobal that, "Low agricultural productivity in sub-Saharan Africa is a result of inadequate inputs such as fertilizer and water, limited uptake of new technologies such as new seed varieties, as well as restrictions in rural infrastructure."
Caloustas Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development at Harvard University noted that the lag in revising agricultural education and training stems from not incorporating the actual needs of farmers. "The main challenge is that ministries of education provide formal academic education which is not suited to the practical needs of farmers," notes Juma. "Extension services which used to provide technical support to farmers have virtually collapsed. The outcome of this situation is poor technical support to farmers."
Women are another critical piece to solving the nutrition puzzle. The report identifies empowerment of women, who make up nearly half the population active in agriculture but have the least control of land worldwide, as critical to ensuring food security and advancing human development. Leveling the playing field for women in agriculture, from improving access to necessary inputs and information to strengthening women's right to land, can maximize agricultural productivity.
Additionally, expanding women's capabilities through education and healthcare can tackle both existing and intergenerational nutritional deficiency, as women will have greater agency in household and reproductive decisions.
Without addressing these root causes, however, food security will persist in Africa. As Levine points out to MediaGlobal, nutritional deprivation is ongoing due to the inadequacy of necessary inputs and infrastructure, contributing to seasonal fluctuation in prices of staple crops. After a harvest, excess crops hit the market and drive down prices; without storage mechanisms, farmers have no means to preserve their goods or maximize returns.
"Credit facilities are not available so I'm not able to smooth my consumption…a symptom of a lot of factors," describes Levine. "These price changes are driven by local conditions, and they have devastating consequences on food security. These are not exceptional phenomenon…this is a daily occurrence or seasonal, monthly occurrence. There is a lot of potential deprivation to be eased by focusing on these local production conditions."
According to the UN's Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), Africa is expected to lead urban population growth in the coming decades, and food security will be as much an issue of feeding its population as it is supporting livelihoods which directly impact access to and availability of sufficient food. Moreover, if the effects of climate change go unchecked, sub-Saharan Africa stands to lose significant ground in the progress it has made, as regions already begin to experience more erratic weather patterns.
The upcoming Rio+20 Summit will provide a critical platform to engage the pressing nature of food insecurity in one of the most rapidly growing regions in the world. "Food security is a really good example of how inter-locked the three strands of sustainable development–economic, social, and environmental–really are," concludes Levine. "In sub-Saharan Africa, having more than a quarter of the population go hungry and almost 55 million children stunted in their physical growth represents a profound threat to the sustainable development of the region."
Levine describes numerous steps for international collaboration, including raising public funds for agricultural research, removing subsidies and other distortions in developed country food markets, improving coordination of export policy responses and sharing information on food stocks and trade flows, and strengthening of national systems for social protection.
The region's triumph in recent years combating a spate of long-standing troubles, from sluggish economic growth to health epidemics, gives reason to believe that Africa can redirect its course. A revitalized agricultural sector and a healthy population are indispensable for Africa to sustain, if not exceed, its upward trajectory for greater economic growth through development.
