Africa’s capacity to feed itself now and in the future
remains a major challenge, despite its enormous agricultural potentials to
produce enough food for the continent and sell surplus produce.
According to Dr. Abdalla Hamdok, Deputy Executive
Secretary, UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), transforming agriculture
into a more dynamic commercial-oriented sector will improve productivity,
create jobs, generate income and enhance livelihoods.
“Increasing agricultural productivity alone is not
sufficient enough to ensure food security,” he observed. “Agriculture must
gradually transition from subsistence to agriculture as a business in order to
achieve the objective of ending hunger and alleviating poverty.”
Dr. Hamdok was addressing the opening session of the
Fourth Conference on Climate Change and Development in Africa (CCDA-IV) in
Marracach, Morroco. The theme for this year’s conference is “Africa can Feed
Africa Now: Translating Climate Knowledge into Action.”
To achieve the set objective, he recommends more value
addition, agro-processing and agribusiness as well as improved access to
markets.
“Limited access to markets, both at local and regional
level perpetuates poverty and food deficiency whereas improved infrastructure
would not only open up access to markets but also help address challenges of
climate change and facilitating movement of food from areas of surplus to those
that suffer crop failure due with impacts of climate change,” noted Dr. Hamdok.
Agriculture remains the single most important sector in
many African economies, accounting for at least 30percent of national incomes
and forming the bulk of export earnings. But the continent continues to spend
colossal amounts of money annually – between $40-$50billion – importing
agricultural products, inspite enormous resource endowment, unutilized arable
land, fresh water resources and human capital to produce sufficiently.
Dr Fatima Denton, Director, Special Initiative
Division, noted that Africa is missing the opportunity to use agriculture as a
foundation for industrial pathway.
“Agriculture has not served as a transformational hub
in fuelling economic growth and propelling industrialization,” she said.
She however there is a major opportunity in turning
agriculture in Africa as the engine of development.
“This will require a deep reflection not just about
producing more food, but also how we produce it using SMART agriculture for
example,” said Dr. Denton.
Dr. Hamdok wants scientific and technological interventions
and innovations efficiently harnessed to transform the agricultural sector.
“The availability of reliable and sufficient energy to
drive this transformation process is critical across the entire agricultural
value chain,” he stated.
According Ms. Yacine Fal of the African Development
Bank (AfDB), the CCDA-IV is an opportunity for the Bank to hear from experts
and stakeholders in designing its new agriculture strategy.
“We are convinced that the recommendations that will
come from this important conference will be soon translated into actions by our
respective countries. For our part, we stand ready to support any and all
actions that are bankable and fall within the remit of the African Development
Bank Mandate,” she said.
