AgriFocus African Markets

Top Menu

  • Advertise
  • Horticulture
  • Aquaculture
  • Crops
  • Livestock
  • Machinery
  • Technology
  • Directory
  • subscribe

Main Menu

  • Home
  • International News
  • Local News
  • Agribusiness
  • Events
  • Magazine
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
Sign in / Join

Login

Welcome! Login in to your account
Lost your password?
Register

Lost Password

Back to login

Register

Back to login
  • Advertise
  • Horticulture
  • Aquaculture
  • Crops
  • Livestock
  • Machinery
  • Technology
  • Directory
  • subscribe

logo

Header Banner

AgriFocus African Markets

  • Home
  • International News
  • Local News
  • Agribusiness
  • Events
  • Magazine
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • Agribusiness Confidence Index declines in Q4 of 2019

  • South Africa is missing out on fresh fruit export growth. What it needs to do

  • TOMRA Sorting Food: MAKING THE FUTURE OF FOOD SUSTAINABLE

  • Two chutney recipes as festive stocking fillers.

  • South African Police Service to reclassify abalone poaching as serious priority crime

  • BMG’s Ammeraal Beltech Rapplon folder gluer belts meet FDA and EC standards for contact with foodstuffs

  • Ceremony in Addis Ababa celebrates the appointment of Wereta International Business PLC as Case IH distributor for Ethiopia

  • Vegetable Gardening: 25 Tips & Tricks

  • WATCH: Agritech Africa 2020

  • Technology and Innovation Will Help Speed Up Removal of Land Sector Corruption in Africa

Agribusiness
Home›Agribusiness›Agroecology as innovation

Agroecology as innovation

By Brandon Moss
July 12, 2019
78
0
Share:
Recently, the High Level Panel of Experts of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) released its much-anticipated report on agroecology. The report signals the continuing shift in emphasis in the UN agency’s approach to agricultural development.

As outgoing FAO director-general, Jose Graziano da Silva has indicated: “We need to promote a transformative change in the way that we produce and consume food. We need to put forward sustainable food systems that offer healthy and nutritious food, and also preserve the environment. Agroecology can offer several contributions to this process.”

The commissioned report: Agroecological and other innovative approaches for sustainable agriculture and food systems that enhance food security and nutrition.

Two years in the making, the report makes clear the urgent need for change. “Food systems are at a crossroads. “Profound transformation is needed,” the summary begins. It stresses the importance of ecological agriculture, which supports “diversified and resilient production systems, including mixed livestock, fish, cropping, and agroforestry, that preserve and enhance biodiversity, as well as the natural resource base.”

It is not surprising, of course, that those with financial interests in the current input-intensive systems are responding to growing calls for agroecology with attacks on its efficacy as a systematic approach that can sustainably feed a growing population. What is surprising is that such responses are so ill-informed about the scientific innovations agroecology offers to small-scale farmers who are being so poorly served by “green revolution” approaches.

One recent article from a researcher associated with a pro-biotechnology institute in Uganda was downright dismissive, equating agroecology with “traditional agriculture,” a step backwards toward the low-productivity practices that prevail today. “The practices that agroecology promotes are not qualitatively different from those currently in widespread use among smallholder farmers in Uganda and sub-Saharan Africa more broadly,” writes Nassib Mugwanya of the Uganda Biosciences Research Center. “I have come to conclude that agroecology is a dead-end for Africa, for the rather obvious reason that most African agriculture already follows its principles.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. As the new expert report shows, and as countless ecological scientists around the world can attest, agroecology brings much-needed innovations to prevailing smallholder practices. With a long track record of achievements in widely varying environments, the approach has been shown to improve soil fertility, increase crop and diet diversity, raise total food productivity, improve resilience to climate change, and increase farmers’ food and income security while decreasing their dependence on costly inputs.

The failing policies of the present

The predominant input-intensive approach to agricultural development can hardly claim such successes, which is precisely why international institutions are actively seeking alternatives. The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) is the poster child for the promotion of input-intensive agriculture in Africa. At its outset 13 years ago, AGRA and its main sponsor, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, set the goals of doubling the productivity and incomes of 30 million smallholder households on the continent.

There is no evidence that approach will come anywhere near meeting those worthy objectives, even with many African governments spending large portions of their agricultural budgets to subsidise the purchase of green revolution inputs of commercial seeds and synthetic fertilisers. National-level data, summarised in the conclusion to my book Eating Tomorrow, attests to this failure:

• Smallholders mostly cannot afford the inputs, and the added production they see does not cover their costs.

• Rural poverty has barely improved since AGRA’s launch; neither has rural food insecurity. Global Hunger Index scores remained in the “serious” to “alarming” category for 12 of the 13 AGRA countries.

• Even in priority crops like maize and rice, few of AGRA’s 13 priority countries have seen sustained productivity increases.

• Production increases for maize in Zambia have come as much from shifting land into subsidised maize production as from raising productivity from commercial seeds and fertilisers.

• There is no evidence of improved soil fertility; in fact, many farmers have experienced a decline as mono-cropping and synthetic fertilisers have increased acidification and reduced much-needed organic matter.

• Costly input subsidies have shifted land out of drought-tolerant, nutritious crops such as sorghum and millet in favour of commercial alternatives. Crop diversity and diet diversity have decreased as a result.

A recent article in the journal Food Policy surveyed the evidence from seven countries with input subsidy programs and found little evidence of sustained—or sustainable—success. “The empirical record is increasingly clear that improved seed and fertiliser are not sufficient to achieve profitable, productive, and sustainable farming systems in most parts of Africa,” wrote the authors in the conclusion.

Agroecology: Solving farmers’ problems

Branding agroecology as a backwards-looking, do-nothing approach to traditional agriculture is a defensive response to the failures of Green Revolution practices. In fact, agroecological sciences offer just the kinds of innovations small-scale farmers need to increase soil fertility, raise productivity, improve food and nutrition security, and build climate resilience.

Do these innovations sound backwards looking to you?

Biological pest control – Scientist Hans Herren won a World Food Prize for halting the spread of a cassava pest in Africa by introducing a wasp that naturally controlled the infestation.

Push-pull technology – Using a scientifically proven mix of crops to push pests away from food crops and pull them out of the field, farmers have been able to reduce pesticide use while increasing productivity.

Participatory plant breeding – Agronomists work with farmers to identify the most productive and desirable seed varieties and improve them through careful seed selection and farm management. In the process, degraded local varieties can be improved or replaced with locally adapted alternatives.

Agro-forestry – A wide range of scientists has demonstrated the soil-building potential of incorporating trees and cover crops onto small-scale farms. Carefully selected tree varieties can fix nitrogen in the soil, reduce erosion, and give farmers a much-needed cash crop while restoring degraded land.

Small livestock – Reintroducing goats or other small livestock onto farms has been shown to provide farmers with a sustainable source of manure while adding needed protein to local diets. Science-driven production of compost can dramatically improve soil quality.

These innovations and many others are explored in-depth in the new U.N. report, the full version of which will be available in English in mid-July, other FAO languages in September. Those advocates of industrial agriculture would do well to read it closely so they can update their understanding of the sustainable innovations agroecological sciences offer to small-scale farmers, most of whom have seen no improvements in their farms, incomes, or food security using Green Revolution approaches.

Many farmers have concluded that the Green Revolution, not agroecology, is a dead-end for Africa.

Originally Published on Food Tank.

Previous Article

New report: 10-year outlook on global agriculture ...

Next Article

The scourge of antibiotics in animal feed

0
Shares
  • 0
  • +
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

Brandon Moss

Related articles More from author

  • Agribusiness

    Good performance in SA agricultural exports despite the drought

    June 11, 2019
    By Brandon Moss
  • Agribusiness

    Exxaro to pay R1.55bn for 100% of Cennergi as firm seeks to realise non-coal energy ambitions

    September 17, 2019
    By Brandon Moss
  • Agribusiness

    Herdwatch launches Growth Partners Programme with major UK Agri-retail chain

    June 14, 2019
    By Brandon Moss
  • AgribusinessCrops

    How African intra-continental trade can benefit land reform, agriculture

    November 25, 2019
    By Brandon Moss
  • Agribusiness

    EU to fund Kenyan smallholder agribusinesses in latest boost for agriculture

    June 14, 2019
    By Brandon Moss
  • Agribusiness

    Tru-Cape’s New Variety Specialist, Buks Nel, is 2019’s Agriculturist of the Year.

    November 18, 2019
    By Brandon Moss

Leave a reply Cancel reply

You may be interested in

  • International News

    Celebrating Kleine Zalze’s second straight win as best New World Producer

  • Local News

    Presidential panel submits long-delayed report on South African land reform

  • International News

    AGCO Africa provides mechanization for key agriculture project in Mozambique

Timeline

  • December 9, 2019

    Agribusiness Confidence Index declines in Q4 of 2019

  • December 9, 2019

    South Africa is missing out on fresh fruit export growth. What it needs to do

  • December 5, 2019

    TOMRA Sorting Food: MAKING THE FUTURE OF FOOD SUSTAINABLE

  • December 5, 2019

    Two chutney recipes as festive stocking fillers.

  • December 3, 2019

    South African Police Service to reclassify abalone poaching as serious priority crime

Find us on Facebook

Latest News

  • Agribusiness Confidence Index declines in Q4 of 2019
  • South Africa is missing out on fresh fruit export growth. What it needs to do
  • TOMRA Sorting Food: MAKING THE FUTURE OF FOOD SUSTAINABLE
  • Two chutney recipes as festive stocking fillers.
  • South African Police Service to reclassify abalone poaching as serious priority crime

Archives

Image Galary

    The Agrifocus African Markets Magazine and the www.agrifocusafrica.com Online Portal are registered and published under Lothbrok Media, A devision of The Lothbrok Group. All Rights Reserved. www.lothbrokmedia.com

    • Recent

    • Popular

    • Comments

    • Agribusiness Confidence Index declines in Q4 of 2019

      By Brandon Moss
      December 9, 2019
    • South Africa is missing out on fresh fruit export growth. What it needs to do

      By Brandon Moss
      December 9, 2019
    • TOMRA Sorting Food: MAKING THE FUTURE OF FOOD SUSTAINABLE

      By Brandon Moss
      December 5, 2019
    • Two chutney recipes as festive stocking fillers.

      By Brandon Moss
      December 5, 2019
    • Officials, Plantation Owners, Tech Companies and Funding Agencies to Attend 6th Commercial Farm Africa in ...

      By Brandon Moss
      September 11, 2019
    • EU-African task force proposes new way ahead for African rural development

      By Brandon Moss
      June 10, 2015
    • Kenya moves closer to goal of 100% renewable energy generation by 2030

      By Brandon Moss
      July 29, 2019
    • Oak Valley Farm to equality court

      By Brandon Moss
      July 4, 2019
    • ctshirts offer code
      on
      December 5, 2019

      Officials, Plantation Owners, Tech Companies and Funding Agencies to Attend 6th Commercial Farm Africa in Nairobi

      Thanks to my father ...
    • t shirt 1 terre haute
      on
      December 5, 2019

      Officials, Plantation Owners, Tech Companies and Funding Agencies to Attend 6th Commercial Farm Africa in Nairobi

      Hey there! I could ...
    • ugly christmas sweater on sale
      on
      December 5, 2019

      Officials, Plantation Owners, Tech Companies and Funding Agencies to Attend 6th Commercial Farm Africa in Nairobi

      Hello outstanding website! Does ...
    • ugly christmas sweater hoodie
      on
      December 5, 2019

      Officials, Plantation Owners, Tech Companies and Funding Agencies to Attend 6th Commercial Farm Africa in Nairobi

      Hello there! This is ...

    Contact Us

    Head Office
    5 The Ferns, 364 Pretoria Avenue, Randburg, South Africa, 2194

    Tell : +27 67 212 7565
    Fax: 086 678 6956
    www.lothbrokmedia.com

    Sales and Advertising
    Dowellcs@lothbrokmedia.com
    Brandonm@Agrifocusafrica.com

    Accounts
    Info@lothbrokmedia.com

    Zambia
    33 Malata Road, Madras,Lusaka, Zambia 3928Tell:+ 26 76 136 3654
    Email Info
    Info@agrifocusafrica.com

     

    • Privacy Policy
    © Copyright www.agrifocusafrica.com. All rights reserved.