A famous saying goes: To whom much is given, much is expected. This is the message that the African Development Bank (AfDB) is carrying and delivering for, and on behalf of Africa at the global conference on climate change, COP21, which opened Monday, 30th November.

“All fingers are not equal. Those who pollute more should do more in saving our planet,” said AfDB President, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, who is leading his bank’s team at the climate change conference in Paris.

Adesina, a former Minister of Agriculture in Nigeria, knows what climate change has done and what its implications are for Africa’s agricultural development if nothing is done to halt global warming.

“The danger that Africa will not be able to feed itself is a real one. And if we don’t have resources to adapt to climate change, Africa will not be able to unlock potential in agriculture,” said Adesina, highlighting the implications of climate change variability on Africa’s agricultural transformation agenda.

He says the bank’s message at the COP 21 was clear: a new climate deal that does not work for Africa is no deal at all.

According to Dr. Adesina, the major and historic polluters must take a fair share of responsibility not only to cut their emissions but also help the suffering adapt to climate impacts.

The AfDB’s stance resonates with a long standing position of the African Group of Negotiators (AGN)which has been pushing for a common but differentiated principle demanding historic emitters to cut emissions to keep warming below 1.5 degrees celsius and provide funding for adaptation for vulnerable countries, most of which are in Africa.

With impacts ranging from droughts and floods affecting agricultural production and water availability in the southern and Sahel regions of Africa, to shrinking rivers, a classic example being Lake Chad, African countries are hoping for a climate deal that would address these challenges both in the short and long term.

“Adaptation as you know is key for Africa but this time we are demanding a high level of adaptation equal to mitigation because we know that the two are closely linked,” Chair of the African Group of Negotiators Nagmeldin Elhassan told a high level panel discussion at the on-going climate talks in Paris.

Nagmeldin said African heads of state are expecting nothing short of a fair and just deal for the continent, a victim of circumstances it never caused.

He said adaptation would be a key issue at the COP 21 negotiating table for Africa as over the years, the African Group of Negotiators has been seeking for parity between mitigation, adaptation and provisions for enhancing means of implementation, noting the increased burden for adaptation in developing countries.

“When we speak adaptation, we link it to means of implementation as a way of getting developed countries involved to provide support,” the AGN chair said.

And the African Union Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture, Rhoda Peace Tumutsime puts it categorically that, “Unless we get a good deal here, that will help with the right technology, we will not be able to modernize and transform agriculture.”

The question of means of implementation is a critical component of this year’s COP. According the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa-(UNECA), climate change could stimulate developing economies into adapting sustainable development paths, through entrepreneurial opportunities, and spaces for policy makers to address equity concerns in gender and youth policies.

Dr. Carlos Lopez of UNECA argues Africa’s possible positive outcome from danger. “Despite all the negative news that is reported about Africa, there are opportunities that we can take advantage of. It is very important to get the perceptions right about Africa’s challenges and available opportunities. In all the bad news are potential areas for growth,” he said.

Dr Lopez said Africa has a massive advantage to develop differently by embracing the opportunities that climate change offers to develop sustainably.

“It is also important for us to realize that we are not going to make it using the same carbon intensive model…let’s take for example, under the 2063 agenda we have to create 122 million jobs. Following the carbon path, we will only create 54 million jobs, but what about the deficit?” he asked.

Citing various examples of opportunities among which is renewable energy owing to Africa’s natural potential of solar, the UNECA Chief is more than convinced that the continent should be part of the solution and “achieve industrialization which is cleaner, greener, without following the carbon model.”

However, the question of resources still remains. Will the climate deal offer Africa this opportunity? The next week or so will decide what and which way forward.

(End)

By Roberto Azevêdo
GENEVA, Jul 29 2014 (IPS)

In the 1960s, there were high hopes for the development of the newly-independent sub-Saharan African countries but these hopes were quickly dashed following a series of shocks which began in the mid-70s, with the first oil price spikes, followed by a severe decline in growth and increase in poverty in the 80s and early 90s. However, by the mid-1990s, economic growth had resumed in certain African countries. Economic reform, better macroeconomic management, donor resources and a sharp rise in commodity prices were having a positive effect.

WTO Director General Roberto Azevêdo. Credit: WTO/CC BY SA-2.0

In the 2000s, many African countries witnessed high economic growth performance and during that period some of the world’s fastest growing economies were in sub-Saharan Africa. Angola, Nigeria, Chad, Mozambique and Rwanda all recorded annual growth of over 7 percent.

In 2012 Africa’s exports and imports totalled 630 billion dollars and 610 billion dollars respectively, ­ a fourfold increase since the turn of the millennium. And the long term prospects for growth are good. The Economist Intelligence Unit has forecast average growth for the regional economy of around 5 percent yearly from 2013-16.

Despite all this, the continent still plays a marginal role in the global market, accounting for barely 3 percent of world trade. One significant reason – although, of course there are others – is that African economies are still narrowly based on the production and export of unprocessed agricultural products, minerals and crude oil.“There is little doubt that the regional [African] market offers good scope for African firms to diversify their production and achieve greater value addition”

Now, due to relatively low productivity and technology, these economies have low competitiveness in global markets – apart from crude extractive products. The low productivity of traditional agriculture and the informal activities continue to absorb more than 80 percent of the labour force. And growth remains highly vulnerable to external shocks.

This story of half a century of struggle, set-backs and progress shows two things:

One, the road to meaningful and inclusive development still seems long.

Two, we are in a better position than ever to make real, sustainable progress.

Many countries are striving to do more in turning their strength in commodities into strengths in other areas,­ using commodities as a means of spurring growth across various sectors. The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa’s 2013 Economic Report echoes this ­ calling for the continent’s commodities to be used to support industrialisation, jobs, growth and economic transformation.

In line with this, I think there are a number of essential steps to take:

– diversification of economic structure, namely of production and exports;

– enhancement of export competitiveness;

– technological upgrading;

– improvement of the productivity of all resources, including labour; and

– reduction of infrastructure gaps.

Only by delivering in these and other areas can policymakers ensure that growth enhances human well-being and contributes to inclusive development. But how can we take these steps?

Of course I should say that although African countries share some common features, no unique set of policies, including those on trade and industrial policy, could ever fit for all in a uniform way. Even among the least-developed countries (LDCs), some are already exporters of manufactured products, although often they rely on a single product  while others are more dependent on commodities. Nevertheless, I think it is clear that some preconditions of success are universal.

African regional integration is of course very high on the policy agenda. There is little doubt that the regional market offers good scope for African firms to diversify their production and achieve greater value addition. Already now, manufactures constitute as much as 40 percent of intra-African exports, compared with 13 percent of Africa’s exports to the rest of the world.

The Bali Package, which World Trade Organisation members agreed in December last year, will help to resolve some problems. Inclusive, sustainable development was at the heart of the whole Bali project ­ and our African members played a crucial role in making it a success. It brought some progress on agriculture. It delivered a package to support LDCs. It provided for a Monitoring Mechanism on special and differential treatment.

And, in addition, Bali delivered the Trade Facilitation Agreement and this is a direct answer to some of the problems of fragmentation. Costly and cumbersome border procedures, inadequate infrastructure and administrative burdens often raise trade-related transaction costs within Africa to unsustainable levels, creating a further barrier to intra-African trade.

This Agreement will help to address some of these bottlenecks. It will support regional integration, and therefore complement the African Union’s efforts to create a continental free trade area. And it will begin to remove some of the barriers which prevent full integration into global value chains. As such it will create an added impetus for industrialisation and inclusive sustainable development.

And it is worth noting here that the Trade Facilitation Agreement broke new ground for developing and least-developed countries in the way it will be implemented.

Another vital issue here is the importance of agricultural development in industrialisation, and the role of industrial collaboration through regional cooperation. The contribution of the agriculture sector is of utmost importance for the establishment of a sound industrial base. It can provide a surplus to invest in industrial capacity building, and supply agricultural raw materials as inputs to the production process, especially for today’s highly specialised food processing industry.

Moreover, it can also significantly contribute to industrialisation by providing an ample supply of food products. This is because food constitutes a large share of what wage earners in African countries spend their money on. Its availability at low prices contributes to increase the purchasing power of wages, and therefore raise the competitiveness of a country in international markets. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

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Irrigation near Kakamas, South Africa. Experts at the African Development Bank (AfDB) say they have witnessed irrigation systems that have been designed based on ecosystems and river basins that have later dried up. Credit: Patrick Burnett/IPS

By Isaiah Esipisu
WARSAW, Dec 9 2013 (IPS)

Africa can achieve sustainable development by scaling up “green economy” initiatives. What is needed is increased allocations from within national budgets supplemented by donor funding, claim experts.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) defines a green economy initiative as one that results in “improved human well-being and social equity, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities.”

In its simplest expression, a green economy is low-carbon, resource efficient, and socially inclusive – according to UNEP.

And now, experts say that embracing this initiative through a concept known as “Low-Carbon Climate Resilient Development” – meaning engaging in projects that will help reduce greenhouse gas emission, help adapt to climate change while boosting income, will help Africa move towards sustainable development

“We do not need to destroy our ecosystem in order to build a road,” said Professor Anthony Nyong, who heads the Gender, Climate Change and Sustainable Development Unit at the African Development Bank (AfDB). “If you need to develop a coal power plant for example, you can come to the Africa Development Bank and propose to put up a solar power plant with a similar output as a way of addressing climate change, and that can form a case for the bank or any similar institution to pay the cost difference,” said Nyong explaining the way countries can raise funds from a bank like the one he works for.

He points out that many of the projects on the ground have not been sustainable. “We have witnessed irrigation systems that have been designed based on ecosystems and river basins that have later dried up, or are likely to dry up in the coming years,” he told IPS at the negotiations on climate change in Warsaw, Poland. “It is time to make decisions based on properly identified science.”

Nyong’s work at the AfDB is in line with the Low-Carbon Climate Resilient Development approach, which calls for governments to develop policies that will enable them to simultaneously adapt to climate change, reduce carbon emissions and contribute towards economic development.

Agriculture is one of the sectors that can be used to address the low-carbon development approach, said Tom Owiyo, a senior specialist for Agriculture and Climate Change – African Climate Policy Centre at the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa. “There is need to invest more in agriculture, so that it is not seen merely as a social engagement for the poor,” he said.

However, the low-carbon climate development concept involves all the sectors of economy including power generation, where countries are encouraged to invest in climate friendly power plants, the transport sector, the manufacturing sector, among others.

In a side event at the COP19, Henry Neufeldt, head of climate change research at the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) said that the global food system emits between 9.5 and 14.7 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere every year. This amounts to between 19 to 29 percent of the total greenhouse gases bothering the world today.

Yet some of the methods that can be used to reduce such emissions include minimum tillage, rotation with legumes, intercropping with legumes, growing drought tolerant crops, and use of improved storage and processing technologies.

In the livestock industry, Neufeldt advocates for increased feeding efficiency, improved rangeland management, efficient treatment of manure and improved livestock health. And if one has to grow trees, then they should be multipurpose trees.

Dr Wilbur Ottichilo, a legislator and environmental expert who is a member of Kenya’s negotiating team in Warsaw, gives an example.
“Farmers in different parts of the country are already practicing farming with minimum tillage as a way of improving soil health and sequestering carbon, and so on,” said the legislator.

The “smart village” is a project implemented by the research program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) with funding from the World Bank.

Through the initiative, farmers have learnt how to keep their farms evergreen throughout the year, which makes them earn more, they are trying their hands on greenhouse farming for the first time, drip irrigation, among other techniques that have increased their food production by 60 percent,  while at the same time fighting climate change.

In the same country, the AfDB and other institutions have invested heavily in generation of electricity using geothermal plants. As well, the country is also putting up a wind driven power generation plant with funding from multilateral donors. “These are all low-carbon development projects that will cut down on emissions, increase adaptation, and at the same time generate revenue for the country,” said Ottichilo.

Isaac Ochieng Okwanyi has had his most successful harvest ever after using lime to improve the quality of his soil. African leaders agreed that agricultural investment and budgeting for the continent’s poor will end extreme hunger. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS

By Matthew Newsome
ADDIS ABABA , Jul 2 2013 (IPS)

As Africa transforms its economy, it will need modern jobs and increased productivity to fight hunger on the continent, African leaders agreed at a two-day summit.

The leaders agreed that agricultural investment and budgeting for the continent’s poor will end extreme hunger and boost the development of African economies when they met at the “End Hunger in Africa by 2025” summit in Addis Abba from Jun. 30 to Jul. 1.

“Africa is discussing the transformation of its economy and to do this we need to put the (focus) on what losses are being made because of hunger on the continent, and what needs investment,” Carlos Lopes, executive secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, told IPS.

“The need for investment in agribusiness, modernisation of agriculture and a transformation of Africa’s industrial base is what I have been impressing on heads of state. Africa needs modern jobs and a totally different type of productivity,” he said.

The summit was the biggest meeting focused on ending hunger in Africa since the Comprehensive Agricultural African Development Programme (CAADP) declaration in 2003. CAADP was established as an initiative for the mobilisation of resources, for south–south commitment and for countries to dedicate a portion of their national budgets to poverty reduction via investment in smallholder farmers.

The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank estimate economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa will reach 5.5 percent in 2013 and 6.1 percent in 2014, well above the global average. Yet one quarter of all Africans still suffer from chronic hunger.

But Africa is looking to Brazil for solutions. In 2003, former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva launched the widely-praised Zero Hunger programme in his country, which helped 28 million people overcome extreme poverty in two years.

Lula advised African leaders at the summit to see pro-poor spending as an investment and not as an expense. “It was a stimulus to Brazil’s economic growth, where the poor quickly became consumers,” he said.

Brazil currently buys 30 percent of the ingredients for school meals from smallholder farmers. The country, which has the fastest-growing middle class in Latin America, annually invests 500 million dollars in purchasing food from smallholder farmers and 12 billion dollars in direct cash transfers to assist farmers “grow” out of poverty.

“If it’s possible in Brazil, then it’s possible in Africa,” da Silva said.

African leaders agreed to boost their support to farmers by increasing cash transfers and purchases of produce to guarantee demand for small farmers’ produce.

Brazilian Minister of Social Development and Hunger Alleviation Tereza Campello told IPS that overcoming hunger was not only a moral imperative “but a choice of model economic development with heightened social inclusion.

“In Brazil, the creation of formal employment, the increase of the minimum wage, the strengthening of small-scale farmers and the implementation of conditional cash transfer programmes have all helped to minimise hunger,” Campello said.

Forngueh Alangeh Romanus Che, councillor of the Regional Platform of Farmers’ Organisations in Central Africa, said that although the Zero Hunger programme was successful in Brazil, any similar initiative launched in Africa must be mindful of the regional context.

“We need the Zero Hunger scheme to be given an African context. We need regional integration on the continent for the free movement of people and goods,” Che told IPS.

He said that Africa needed more than a social protection scheme.

“We need to develop social and economical schemes that fast track agricultural production. Pro-poor spending in Africa needs to give farmers access to credit and access to land,” he said.

Malawi is one of the African countries that have achieved the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving hunger by 2015. The southern African nation has come to acknowledge in recent years that investment in agricultural development positively impacts other MDGs such as access to clean water, healthcare and the economic empowerment of women.

Domestic spending in Malawi’s agricultural sector has been increasing by between five to eight percent per year. The country currently devotes 18 percent of its annual national budget to agriculture, while CAADP requires only 10 percent of a country’s national budget.

“Agricultural investment is essential to our country, otherwise we risk total collapse in terms of food security, the economy and the population,” Malawi’s Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Peter Mwanza told IPS.

Malawi’s economy is agriculturally dependent on the export of sugar, cotton, legumes and cassavas. Eighty-five percent of foreign exchange is earned from the farming sector, and 80 percent of the labour force is employed in the food and agriculture sector. Government and private sector investment in Malawi’s farmers is now seen as more critical than ever to the country’s resilience.

And, Mwanza said, investment in commercial agriculture to produce Malawi’s staple foods – cassava, maize and rice – will create a surplus that will in turn guarantee food security and a higher income for small farmers.

“It’s time to think big. We need private large-scale commercial production of our agriculture for export purposes. We want to attract more investors as they will make the economy strong and therefore our farmers stronger as a result of greater employment and income,” he said.

By Mekonnen Teshome and Miriam Gathigah
ADDIS ABABA , Feb 21 2012 (IPS)

Ethiopia says that the double-digit economic growth the country has experienced over the last seven years has started benefitting its majority by boosting their income and productivity in agriculture and small-scale businesses.

While the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank state that the country has registered 8.7 percent GDP growth, the government claims the economy has grown by 11.4 percent.

However, the country was declared the second-fastest growing economy in Africa for 2011, after Ghana, in the annual economic report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).

In the past, Ethiopia has made headlines for recording some of the worst famine situations in Africa, and for its poor health indicators – it has posted one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. In 2005, 871 women died per 100,000 live births.

But this is slowly changing as the government has made progress in the provision of social services such as health, education and infrastructure.

“In 2010, Ethiopia continued to register the fast growth, as it has for the last five years. GDP growth in 2010 remained strong at 8.8 percent. Growth is driven by the service sector (14.5 percent), followed by the industrial (10.2 percent) and agricultural (six percent) sectors,” the ECA report indicated.

In an exclusive interview with IPS, State Minister of the Office of Government Communication Affairs, Alemayehu Ejigu, said Ethiopia has registered remarkable growth by increasing major crop production from 11.9 percent in 2005 to 18.08 percent by the end of 2010. People’s lives are changing for the better in rural and urban areas because of health facilities and infrastructure development, he said.

Ejigu attributed the success to the effective implementation of the national five-year Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP). He said that the country’s GTP for 2011 to 2016 would help Ethiopia join the grouping of middle-income countries.

Ejigu also told IPS that the government planned job creation opportunities through the construction of 73,000 kilometres of rural roads. “This would create an opportunity for farmers to easily transport agricultural products to market,” Ejigu said.

Abeba Bezu, an economic affairs consultant in Addis Ababa, said that under the country’s ambitious Plan for Accelerated and Sustained Development to End Poverty government had reduced poverty from 38.7 percent in 2005 to 31 percent five years later.

“Although struggling with a large population estimated to be 82 million people, making it the second-most populous country in Sub-Saharan Africa, there has been significant progress towards improving livelihoods. There is notable development.”

However, assistant Professor Teshome Adugna at the Economics Department of the Ethiopian Civil Service University cautioned that as GDP considers the market value of goods and services, it cannot be a perfect instrument to show the country’s actual growth, given Ethiopia’s poor record handling and management systems.

“Since the GDP reporting does not provide information on who produces how much, it is difficult to know how individual citizens benefit from the reported growth,” he said.

Adugna described Ethiopia’s growth as “broad-based”, which he attributed to the growth of the agricultural, industrial and service sectors.

“Of course, we should not expect urban unemployment to end very shortly,

“I can say that many people are benefiting from the economic growth in Ethiopia, but I would not say that the life of the majority has improved. We need time to bring about social development that can change the lives of the majority.”

Ten years ago, only two thirds of Ethiopians had access to healthcare services, leaving another 68 million people across the expansive rural areas in dire need.

“Since 2004, the Ministry of Health has expanded access to healthcare through the Health Extension Programme (HEP), which targets the rural population,” said Amanuel Ayalew, a volunteer health worker in northern Ethiopia.

As a result, Ethiopia’s country report by the Department for International Development (DFID), the United Kingdom’s government department responsible for promoting development and poverty reduction, revealed that the impact of the health programme is notable since HEP reaches nine million households. DFID will spend an average of 524 million dollars per year in Ethiopia until 2015.

With more than 35 million insecticide-treated bed nets for malaria, there has been a 73 percent reduction in malaria cases. This, coupled with a massive and consistent vaccination programme for children under five against killer diseases, has seen deaths in that age group reduced by a significant 62 percent in villages with access to HEP.

There are now about 1.4 million more women on contraceptives than there were in 2005, and the gross primary school enrolment rate has risen from 91.3 to 96 percent between 2005 and 2010.

However, challenges remain.

“In spite of a constituent economic growth of double digits in the last five years with economic analysts projecting a similarly impressive growth, sustainable growth and poverty reduction remains a challenge,” Bezu said.

A majority of rural poor are still grappling with severe climate change and are still highly susceptible to drought.

It is a situation that government partially acknowledges. “When we say the country is growing it does not mean that every citizen has no problem…even in the United States there are people who are provided with food aid,” Ejigu said. He, however, added that no one would die of starvation as there would be no food shortages in the country.

It is a view that the leader of the opposition Ethiopian Democratic Party, Mushe Semu, does not agree with.

“Ethiopia is a country where many citizens are starved. It is not a question of having food two or three times a day,” Semu told IPS.

He said it was impossible for Ethiopia to become a middle-income country. “When we think of the majority of the Ethiopian population we are talking about our farmers and rural communities that are 85 percent of the people. Here, the land management and fertility should be considered,” he said.

He said that without effectively distributing all arable land to people, and with the prevailing land degradation, it was not possible to bring about development.

The country is not conducive for private sector growth, analysts say.

The newly completed African Union building in downtown Addis Ababa. Credit: Mekonnen Teshome/IPS

“Although the government envisions a private sector led development, the environment is not conducive for the growth of the private sector. In fact, private investment as a percentage of GDP has remained on the decline since 2004,” Bezu said.

In a World Bank global survey dubbed Ease of Doing Business, in 2010 and 2011 Ethiopia ranked 103 and 104 respectively out of 183 countries.

But meanwhile, civil servant Abiy Getahun said that the double-digit economic growth repeatedly propagated by the government media has not yet brought the desired social development to his life. He cited the low wages paid in Ethiopia, which, according to him, are low compared to the rest of Africa. In the 2011 U.N. Development Programme’s Human Development Report Ethiopia ranks 174 out of 187 countries worldwide.

He said that most people, especially urban dwellers, could not withstand the skyrocketing price of good and services.

“The total salary increment I got over the last 10 years is only 400 Ethiopian Birr (less than 25 dollars) while the price of goods and services has risen in an unbelievable manner.”

* Additional reporting by Miriam Gathigah in Nairobi.

(END/2012)

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