Brexit may provide boost for African agriculture

Trade deals – particularly with powerful trading blocs such as the EU – have not generally gone well for individual African states trying to secure access to one of the world’s wealthiest markets.

A crop duster flies over a wheat field in Kenya. Next to raw minerals, agriculture is the most promising driver of economic growth in Africa. Trevor Snapp / Bloomberg
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A UK departure from the European Union could help African countries to speed up agricultural innovation that is currently held back by stringent health and safety regulations.

Next to raw minerals, agriculture is the most promising driver of economic growth on the continent of 54 countries. With commodity prices flat many countries are struggling with low growth, leaving them scrambling for alternative revenue sources.

However, trade deals – particularly with powerful trading blocs such as the EU – have not generally gone well for individual African states trying to secure access to one of the world’s wealthiest markets.

At the same time, the EU’s raft of health and safety regulations have stifled the deployment of technology such as genetically modified crops (GM), slowing agricultural advancement.

“The EU needs to rethink its attitudes towards African agricultural innovation irrespective of the outcome of UK vote,” says Professor Calestous Juma from the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School in the United States.

A Kenyan national, Prof Juma is one of a growing number of African academics who feel restrictive trade policies that rely on unscientific safety barriers are hindering food security on the continent. Currently GMOs (genetically modified organisms) are widely used in the US and many other countries, including South Africa. However the EU places extensive restrictions and controls on their consumption, making it difficult for African exporters to gain access to the market, Prof Juma says.

At the same time many African countries remained wary of the technology after years of lobbying by anti-GM activists. In 2002, Zambia experienced a severe drought that left millions in need of food aid. After initially accepting shipments of GM maize from the US, Zambia reversed the decision after western activists convinced the government GM crops were a threat to public safety.

“EU policies on transgenic crops that have undermined Africa’s freedom to innovate,” Prof Juma says.

“This was made worse by policies that limit the ability of EU member states to chart out technology partnerships with African countries.”

Even if the UK votes to remain within the union, the EU needs to rethink its attitudes towards African agricultural innovation, Prof Juma notes. “With greater diplomatic flexibility, the UK could lead Europe in playing a more constructive role in Africa’s quest for agricultural renewal.”

The issue does of course remain hotly debated among the public. Many thousands of anti-GM activists took to the streets world wide at the weekend in the latest demonstration by March against Monsanto activists protesting against the global US company of the same name which produces GM seeds. South Africa was one of the first countries outside the US to legalise GM crops, producing maize, soya beans and cotton, among others.

The country’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is looking at developing further strains of crops that are better resistant to drought and local pests.

In neighbouring Zimbabwe, which is staring down the barrel of a nationwide famine, hard choices are going to have to be made. Currently the country, which is likely to need food aid soon following prolonged drought, rarely accepts GM maize imports, except occasionally as emergency aid.

“GM crops are one of the alternative solutions for reducing hunger on the continent among many others which include good agronomic practices,” says Jonathan Mufandaedza, the chief executive at the national biotechnology authority of Zimbabwe, a government agency.

Other countries are also moving towards GM crops. In Kenya, a Water Efficient Maize for Africa project is underway, supported by a public-private partnership, led by the Kenya-based African Agricultural Technology Foundation and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Howard G Buffet Foundation and USAid.

Burkina Faso in west Africa and Sudan have started to grow GM cotton commercially. As GM crops proliferate, trade relations with Europe will grow more complicated. Europe is not likely to want GM material entering its market from Africa when it is refusing to accept to these products from the US.

The result is Europe pressuring African countries not to grow GM crops, Prof Juma says.

“This has forced African nations to turn to countries such as China and Brazil for agricultural technology cooperation.”

The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a US-based foundation said in a recent study that sub-Saharan Africa had an annual farm household income in 2012 of approximately US$3,000. Lack of capital meant few farmers could afford industrial technology such as tractors to improve productivity.

Instead, they should be encouraged to plant high-yield GM crops, the ITIF said.

The study noted that from 1996 to 2013, biotech crops added $133 billion in value to global agricultural production. And, over the same period, about 500 million kilograms less pesticides were used. This significantly boosted farmers’ incomes despite the higher costs of biotech seeds.

In October 19 European countries announced bans on growing GM crops, despite strong opposition from the scientific community. In the UK, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland joined the ban, but England did not.

Potentially, therefore, should the UK leave the EU, it would become easier for African GM crop growers to export their produce to England.

However, that is not much of an incentive for Africa to push for Brexit – compared with the global market, England is a drop in the ocean.

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