Agricultural Investing
At the same time, a report launched at the meeting shows that Africa will be critical to feeding the world’s population projected to reach nine billion by 2050 from about seven million today.However, the projections would depend on the speed under which the continent embraces modern agriculture, including the use of improved seeds and fertilisers.
“We need smart agriculture that increases productivity and labour, seeds that are resilient to drought and diseases,” Mr Annan said when he addressed over 1,000 delegates at the Ngurdoto Mountain Lodge outside Arusha.
He noted that the Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa (Agra) he founded six years ago had developed over 300 high yielding crop varieties.
Mr Kikwete spoke of the need to mechanise the agricultural sector by effectively utilising modern technologies in production.
He said Africa needs to move from rain-fed agriculture by venturing into irrigation farming – a move, he said, that will transform the sector and provide viable outcomes in feeding the continent and the world at large, adding that in order to achieve this mission, more investments in research and development are required.
“Africa has plenty of water resources and land suitable for construction of various small and large scale irrigation schemes, but it is a very small portion of the land which has been utilised,” added Mr Kikwete.He also argued for the importance of motivating smallholder and medium scale farmers to venture into modern agriculture and helping them to find good markets of their produce.
He said at the moment, Tanzania has more than 300 students abroad pursuing research studies and training in a bid to help the country to improve its crops and animal husbandry to realise its Kilimo Kwanza initiatives – through transforming agricultural sector into commercialised farming by putting smallholder farmers at the frontline.
Speaking on the availability of funds for sponsoring the agricultural sector in the region, Mr Kikwete said African governments have the duty to find the best ways of running their agricultural projects instead of depending on donors.
“Donor support to agriculture in Africa has declined from $18 billion twenty years ago to three billion dollars three years ago before increasing to current level of $6 billion,” Mr Kikwete said.
Mr Annan warned against the danger of turning thousands of hectares of arable land in the continent for cultivation of bio-fuel crops.
AGRF aims at developing concrete action plans that will see the African continent commercialising the agricultural sector by fully focusing on smallholder farmers.The international conference on green revolution aims at enlightening Africa to promote food security and sustainability for feeding the continent.
According the recent the World Economic Forum on Africa by the G8 countries G8 meeting which comprised 21 heads of state and 27 companies from private sector, pledged a total $3 billion that will be used for in the continent to promote food security and nutrition as well as liberating more than 50 million people from poverty by 2022.
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