The efforts of Western billionaires to apparently revolutionize farming in Africa have worsened the situation for small-scale farmers, an investigation conducted by ‘The Guardian’ has revealed.
The investigation highlights that the seeming philanthropic initiatives led by the Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation under the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (Agra) – an organization they established promising to transform African farming – appear to be more focused on generating profits for Western companies selling seeds, chemicals, and fertilizers, rather than on empowering Africans to achieve food security.
The report shows that Agra’s policies, such as seed laws that criminalize traditional farming practices such as sharing seeds and consequently forcing African farmers to depend on agribusiness giants like Monsanto, Syngenta and Bayer for farm inputs have contributed to an increase in the number of hungry people in the countries where they operate rather than improve food sufficiency, with the number of the hungry rising from 101.5 million people to 124 million since Agra began its operations in 2006.
The organization operates in 13 African countries of Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger.
Similar past agricultural projects in Latin America and Asia resulted in disastrous outcomes, leaving farmers more impoverished and hungrier, while also disrupting biodiversity.
