admin‘‘Africa has to move away from agriculture for food in the stomach to agriculture for wealth into the economy and into the pockets of farmers,’’ says Marin Bwalya, the head of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP), an AU initiative.
Polity reports that experts say that this needs action from governments and others to invest in research to produce higher-yielding crop varieties, improve marketing and add more value to produce instead of exporting raw commodities from which others profit.
Bwalya’s CAADP has led a drive for change, but progress has been slow.
Edward George, the head of research for soft commodities at Ecobank in London, said farming was being held back by a failure to invest in crop processing and building local African demand.
He said developing local consumption of farm products in Africa could encourage more local industry, avoiding the fate of cocoa farms in Ghana and the Ivory Coast, who earn just 7-8 percent of the value of a chocolate bar made from their cocoa beans. -Polity.
Online Reporter