Final Thoughts

  Sadly, this will be my final post on Water and Food in Africa! I have learnt a lot about the issues facing the continent, but also I've found how these are being overcome. I think it is clear for anyone to see how Africa has and continues to be affected by its horrific colonial history. These must be considered when discussing anything to do with the continent's development- not only in terms of water and food issues. I feel as though I tried to account for this throughout my posts and I hope I managed to not put out an outdated rhetoric that Sub-Saharan Africa is a homogenous continent in 'need' of Western aid. Not to say that this should be applauded, in fact it should really be commonplace. It is quite simple to achieve this, but constant media brainwashing that Africa is a continent to be pitied can result in many from the Global South becoming 'White Saviours'. This is something that needs to be changed and I do believe is changing, however a lot is still left to be done.

Despite common belief, Sub-Saharan Africa is a lot more water rich than most people think. If technologies are harnessed, groundwater potential could help increase both food and water security. Whether large-scale or small-scale irrigation methods are used to achieve this is still up for debate (I think my hesitance over large-scale methods is clear to see in my post). Additionally, GM crops could provide farmers a reliable crop that could help increase food security if distribution is made more accessible. There is a lot of promise here and I am hopeful that Africa will achieve food and water security soon. This can be done by helping local communities' harness and grow their power and agency as they are the people most motivated to achieve these goals.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Water and Food in Africa - A brief introduction

Image
  Welcome to my blog on Water and Food in Africa! This is my first, introductory post where I hope to explain how these three key ideas are linked. Water and food are fundamental to life, which is why they make up two of the key Sustainable development Goals. My posts will aim to discuss certain issues pertaining to the interconnected nature of water and food security in African discourse.                          Water   Water can be considered the most important element for all ecosystems. It is fundamental for the survival and wellbeing of all living organisms. Despite being a renewable resource, its constant exploitation has meant that its resources are not being replenished fast enough to replace usage levels. This is particularly true when you consider the gaping imbalance between freshwater availability and the growing requirement’s of a developing worldwide population , thereby increasing per capita water consumption . Due to this, issues of water shortages become more present,
Read more

Can GM crops help increase food security? Part 2

This blog is a continuation of last week's blog. Here I will discuss how GM crops are currently being used and the developments occurring. Current GM crop use in Africa As mentioned last week, access to GM crops is still unequal. This has meant that currently, South Africa is the only African country commercially growing GM crops.  The GM crops grown are maize, cotton and soya.  However, there are several other countries trialling this as well, namely Egypt, Tanzania and Kenya. Despite this, there are still many concerned about the impact these crops have, resulting in some countries, like Algeria and Sudan, imposing bans on them. As described previously in the context of Zambia, bans can have detrimental effects, such as causing  food shortages due to the rejection of aid.  This shows the differing opinions that exist within the continent.  GM crops have the potential to ensure food security within the region. However. accessibility remains a key issue. High costs set by the biote
Read more

Renewable Groundwater systems: Small-Scale Irrigation

Image
Last week we examined Africa's groundwater potential and how this could ensure water and food security via non-renewable systems. This week the focus will be on smaller-scale renewable extraction methods. Farmer-led irrigation has historically allowed for groundwater usage to occur without depleting the source. This development can be defined as a way in which farmer's take on a more important role when improving their agricultural water usage. This is done via changes in technology use, investment patterns, governance of water and land, and knowledge production. These processes normally occur informally all-over sub-Saharan Africa. Due to the informality of these processes, most farmer-led irrigation is not included in the official figures stating how much of Africa's agriculture is irrigated. This figure is currently 6% , but if these methods were included, it would be significantly higher. I will discuss the different example of farmer-led irrigation below. Shallow Grou
Read more