African farmers are often criticised for growing crops the way their ancestors did. Critics say they must embrace (a very specific version of) modernity. That includes focusing on cash crops, buying hybrid seeds, and using commercial fertiliser.
For the past 20 years, the Nairobi-based Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa has been at the forefront of pushing that model. The organisation, which was launched by the Gates and Rockefeller foundations and later rebranded as Agra, pledged to double yields and incomes for 20-million smallholder households and halve food insecurity by 2020. It has had a profound impact on how countries approach farming.
In Kenya and Malawi, The Continent found farmers stuck in a debt trap, often without better yields. Next week, the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa – a coalition representing tens of millions of small-scale food producers – is releasing a report on Agra’s impact. The Continent obtained an exclusive preview.
It makes for grim reading.
Agra failed its own internal evaluation and then dropped its original goals – with a PR firm going as far as trying to scrub them from Wikipedia. But the African Union is still enshrining its philosophy in its next 10-year plan for how farmers produce food.
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