‘Green food’ not high on Africa’s priority list

While calls for ‘green food’ production are growing louder, mid- to low-income countries are more focused on affordability and access to food rather than on the effect its production has on the environment.

Speaking at the recent virtual International Food and Agribusiness Management Association conference, Prof Ferdi Meyer, managing director of the Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy, noted that if European countries wanted more environmentally friendly farming practices to take hold on a global level, public-private partnerships were needed to assist farmers in Africa.

He agreed that most of the global population did not have the financial means to pay for green food, and the volume of voices coming from developed countries skewed the perception of demand.

“Africa is dealing with very different challenges when it comes to food production. We have different needs and focus areas, and produce on a different scale. The costs throughout the value chain are far higher in Africa than in the highly competitive environments of developed countries.

“Furthermore, there is a view that moving to more carbon-friendly production methods pushes up costs, which are ultimately passed on to the farmer.”

However, he noted that this shift could be made if the larger agricultural companies leapfrogged development of the right practices and processes.

“If this could be done in a way that doesn’t increase costs but improves efficiencies, Africa will be able to produce the green food that benefits the environment. At the same time, it won’t make food inaccessible to the poor.”

Discussing the mounting pressure from EU consumer groups and governments, Yelto Zimmer, managing director of global networks at Agri Benchmark, said farmers had to prepare for a future with fewer crop-care products.

“Besides the political pressure the sector is receiving, the resistance that pests are showing to pesticides means that many [products] will become redundant.”

Paradoxically, Zimmer noted that since the EU was calling for larger areas of Europe’s landscape to be rewilded, which would take land away from agriculture, meeting the continent’s food needs would require mass imports.

“Production will simply be shifted elsewhere,” he said.

Meyer added that for environmentally friendly farming practices to take off in Africa, these innovations would need governments to create an environment that was conducive to investment.

“If [Africa] had better infrastructure, investors would find it more favourable to invest [here]. With more investment, we could generate more growth, which would bring more tax revenue for governments to spend on the kind of projects that would make investment even more forthcoming.” – Lindi Botha