Farmers Review Africa May/June 2017 Farmers Review Africa | Page 22

Insights
Science has the power to
boost farming in Africa
e agricultural sector is the world's largest
tolerance and increased resistance to extreme
A project in Uganda provides an excellent
single employer. It provides jobs for more than climatic conditions, and cross-breeding for example. Ugandan scientist Robert Mwanga
40 percent of the global population. It's also the improved efficiency. won the 2016 World Food Prize for his work in
largest source of income and jobs for poor, And yet hundreds of millions of people in addressing Vitamin A de ciencies. Without
rural households.
Africa are going hungry every day. Globally, Vitamin A, children are more likely to develop
800 million people are categorised as entirely preventable blindness. Working with
It is, by and large, a successful sector. ere chronically hungry. Around 30 percent of people in Uganda's poor, rural areas, Mwanga
have been huge improvements in yields and them – 227 million people – live in Africa. set about substituting, at scale, white sweet
So where is the disconnect between food Vitamin A-rich alternative.
potato – which is low in Vitamin A – with a
food production over the past ve decades.
More cereals have been produced annually
during the past 40 years than in any earlier production and food security in Africa? Why period. It is also predicted that more grain will does the continent spend about $40-billion a In Ethiopia, Gebisa Ejeta was awarded the 2009
be harvested in 2017 than in any year in year importing food when so many of its own World Food Prize for his work on improving the
history. is is as a consequence of scienti c residents are farmers? And how can this food supply of hundreds of millions of people in
advances, increased fertiliser use and situation be changed? sub-Saharan Africa by increasing the production
favourable rainfall patterns.
At least part of the answer lies with science. of sorghum hybrids resistant to drought and the
ere are already several excellent examples of parasitic Striga weed.
Many of these gains have been felt in Africa. ways in which science has led to dramatic None of these projects would have been possible
Improved seed varieties, new fertilisers and increases in food production and moved without governments supporting the research
pesticides, improved credit and market access farmers in some countries closer to self- that lay behind them. But much more needs to
have all played a role. So have scienti c sufficiency. be done. Research shows that investing an extra
Science at work development globally over the next 15 years
$88-billion in agricultural research and
innovations such as improved and more
reliable weather prediction, improved drought
May - June 2017
[22]
FARMERS
REVIEW AFRICA
www.farmersreviewafrica.com