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Most recent bulletins on food and agriculture
August 3, 2020 Africa/Global: Preventing the Next Pandemic
http://www.africafocus.org/docs20/zoo2008.php
“COVID-19 is just one example of the rising trend of diseases –
from Ebola to MERS to West Nile and Rift Valley fevers – caused by
viruses that have jumped from animal hosts into the human
population. … The rising trend in zoonotic diseases is driven by
the degradation of our natural environment – through land
degradation, wildlife exploitation, resource extraction, climate
change, and other stresses.” - Press release from UN Environment
Programme (UNEP) and International Livestock Research Institute
(ILRI), Nairobi, July 6, 2020
July 29, 2019 Africa/Global: Agribusiness vs. Agroecology
http://www.africafocus.org/docs19/ag1907.php
“It is not surprising, of course, that those with financial
interests in the current input-intensive systems are responding to
growing calls for agroecology with attacks on its efficacy as a
systematic approach that can sustainably feed a growing population.
What is surprising is that such responses are so ill-informed about
the scientific innovations agroecology offers to small-scale
farmers who are being so poorly served by ´green revolution´ approaches.” - Timothy A. Wise
May 27, 2019 Africa/Global: World Bank Ramps Up Attack on Small Farmers
http://www.africafocus.org/docs19/land1905.php
“Enabling the Business of Agriculture,” promoted by the World Bank,
and now enhanced with a new sub-indicator on land policy, is
presented as a way to advance agricultural development,
particularly in Africa. In reality, notes a new report from the
Oakland Institute, it gives an additional push to a “land rush” by
mostly foreign corporate interests. This trend, notes Harvard land
tenure scholar Pauline Peters, “marks the most radical shift in the
distribution and tenure status of land since colonial times.”
August 15, 2018 West Africa/Europe: From Cocoa to Chocolate
http://www.africafocus.org/docs18/choc1808.php
"Cocoa growing communities, particularly in West Africa, are facing poverty, child
labour and deforestation that have been made worse by a rapid fall in prices for
cocoa. Widely touted efforts in the cocoa industry to improve the lives of farmers,
communities and the environment made in the past decade are having little impact. In
fact, the modest scope of the proposed solutions does not even come close to
addressing the scale of the problem." - Cocoa Barometer, April 2018
May 8, 2017 Africa: World Bank Financing Land Grabs
http://www.africafocus.org/docs17/land1705.php
"The World Bank Group has indirectly financed some of Africa's most notorious land
grabs, according to a report by a group of international development watchdogs. The
World Bank's private-sector arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), is
enabling and profiting from these projects by outsourcing its development funds to
the financial sector." - Oakland Institute
February 20, 2017 Africa/Global: Agribusiness Giants on Merger Path
http://www.africafocus.org/docs17/ag1702.php
"If the Bayer-Monsanto merger is approved, the new merged company
will control almost 30% of the global commercial seed market and
25% of the agrochemical market - making it the world's largest
supplier of seeds and chemicals. In South Africa, it would control
about 30% of both markets. Already today, Monsanto is one of two
companies in South Africa that employs 80% of the private sector
breeders in maize and 100% of the breeders in soybean and sunflower
breeders. " - African Centre for Biodiversity
January 19, 2016 Africa: Stealth Assault on African Seeds
http://www.africafocus.org/docs16/seed1601.php
"There is a renewed and stronger assault on seed ... based on legal
systems that permit exclusive rights over seeds on the spurious
contention that plant varieties were 'discovered' and improved on.
But these 'discovered' varieties are the product of the whole
history of collective human improvements and maintenance carried out
by peasants. To assert exclusive rights over the whole on the basis
of small adjustments is nothing short of outright theft." - SouthSouth
Dialogue, Durban, South Africa, November 2015
February 18, 2015 Africa: Privatizing Land and Seeds
http://www.africafocus.org/docs15/ag1502.php
"The G8 New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition was launched in
2012 by the eight most industrialised countries to mobilise private
capital for investment in African agriculture. To be accepted into
the programme, African governments are required to make important
changes to their land and seed policies. ... [for example] Despite
the fact that more than 80% of all seed in Africa is still produced
and disseminated through 'informal' seed systems (on-farm seed
saving and unregulated distribution between farmers), there is no
recognition in the New Alliance programme of the importance of
farmer-based systems of saving, sharing, exchanging and selling
seeds." - Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa and GRAIN, January
2015
July 31, 2014 Africa/Global: Talking Points on Common Issues
http://www.africafocus.org/docs14/tp1407.php
As African leaders and corporate CEOs gather to meet with
President Obama and U.S. government officials, a wide
variety of civil society activists will also be meeting in
Washington, some in officially recognized side events, others in
alternative venues. Many more will be issuing statements and
communicating their views, some appropriating the twitter hashtag
#AfricaSummit used by U.S. government officials, thus inserting their
views as well into that hashtag stream.
March 17, 2014 Africa/Global: The Right to Food
http://www.africafocus.org/docs14/food1403.php
"The right to food is the right of every individual, alone or in
community with others, to have physical and economic access at all
times to sufficient, adequate and culturally acceptable food that
is produced and consumed sustainably, preserving access to food for
future generations. ... Because of the various channels though
which access to food can be achieved, the creation of decent jobs
in the industry and services sectors plays an essential role in
securing the right to food, as does the provision of social
protection."- Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Final Report
November 9, 2013 Africa: Monopolizing Maize
http://www.africafocus.org/docs13/food1311.php
According to a new report from the African Centre for Biosafety, in
South Africa, "Monsanto's Bt maize, MON810, has failed hopelessly
in South Africa as a result of massive insect resistance, after
only 15 years of its introduction into commercial agriculture." Yet
the same variety is being promoted in other African countries by
projects supported by Monsanto. And South Africa's supply of maize,
a staple food, is dominated by a few large companies and consists
almost entirely of GM crop varieties.
June 12, 2013 Africa: Underdeveloping African Agriculture
http://www.africafocus.org/docs13/ag1306.php
"These interventions from AGRA [Alliance for a Green
Revolution in Africa] and the G8 are, first and foremost,
about opening markets and creating space for
multinational corporations such as Yara, Monsanto and
Cargill, to secure profits. ... As world leaders speak in
philanthropic terms about 'ending hunger', behind the
scenes Africa's seed and trade laws are being
'harmonised' to the whim of agri-business giants. The
efforts of Africa's farmers over millennia stand to be
privatised and expropriated, while traditional and vital
practices such as seed saving and sharing stand to be
criminalised." -- Francis Ngang, Secretary General of
Inades-Formation (http://www.inadesfo.net/)
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