Transcript Long-Term Trends in Food Security: Africa’s Coming Turnaround

Africa’s Turnaround:
From impoverishment to sustainable
growth in agriculture, nutrition and health
Will Masters
Professor and Chair, Department of Food and Nutrition Policy, Tufts University
www.nutrition.tufts.edu | http://sites.tufts.edu/willmasters
MIT Knight Science Journalism Program
Food Boot Camp -- 29 March 2012
What’s behind these stories?
And this?
And this?
Africa’s impoverishment is relatively recent
and may already be ending
Source: Calculated from World Bank (2011), PovcalNet (http://iresearch.worldbank.org/PovcalNet/), updated
11 April 2011. Estimates are based on over 700 household surveys from more than 120 countries, and refer
to per-capita expenditure at purchasing-power parity prices for 2005.
There are limited data and wide variation
but many signs of improvement
The available surveys show
widespread reduction in
poverty rates
Source: Author’s calculation from World Bank (2011), PovcalNet (http://iresearch.worldbank.org/PovcalNet/),
updated 11 April 2011. Estimates are based on over 700 household surveys from more than 120 countries,
and refer to per-capita expenditure at purchasing-power parity prices for 2005.
Undernutrition has also begun to improve
in some African countries
National trends in prevalence of underweight children (0-5 years)
Selected countries with repeated national surveys
Somalia is an
exception, its
malnutrition
worsened
before the
2011 famine
Source: UN SCN. Sixth Report on the World Nutrition Situation. Released October 2010,
at http://www.unscn.org.
Undernutrition levels and trends
vary widely across Africa
National trends in prevalence of underweight children (0-5 years)
Selected countries with repeated national surveys
Conditions in the Sahel
are bad and getting worse;
it is the next Somalia
Source: UN SCN. Sixth Report on the World Nutrition Situation. Released October 2010, at
http://www.unscn.org.
In Africa as elsewhere, nutrition shortfalls
mostly occur before age two
Mean weight-for-height z-scores in 54 countries, 1994-2007, by region (1-59 mo.)
Despite Africa’s greater poverty,
Asian infants remain more malnourished
Weight loss relative to height occurs when
breastfeeding becomes insufficient, but
infants cannot yet rely on the family diet
Source: CG Victora, M de Onis, PC Hallal, M Blössner and R Shrimpton, “Worldwide timing of
growth faltering: revisiting implications for interventions.” Pediatrics, 125(3, Mar. 2010):e473-80.
In Asia, where undernutrition was worst,
we’ve seen >20 years of improvement
National trends in prevalence of underweight children (0-5 years)
Selected countries with repeated national surveys
Source: UN SCN. Sixth Report on the World Nutrition Situation. Released October 2010, at
http://www.unscn.org.
Africa’s green revolution is
at least 20 years behind Asia’s
Source: Reprinted from W.A. Masters, “Paying for Prosperity: How and Why to Invest in Agricultural Research and
Development in Africa” (2005), Journal of International Affairs, 58(2): 35-64.
The rise then fall in Africa’s child-survival
baby boom is also 20 years behind Asia’s
Child and elderly dependency rates by region (0-15 and 65+), 1950-2030
Total dependency rates (ages 0-14 and 65+), 1950-2030
50
Africa had the world’s most severe
demographic burden (>45% )
now a demographic gift
45
40
SS Africa
S Asia
35
SE Asia
Rest of World
30
Source: Calculated from UN Population Projections, 2008 revision (March 2009), at http://esa.un.org/unpp
.
The rise then fall in Africa’s rural
population growth is also 20 years later
Rural population growth rates by region, 1950-2030
Rural population growth (decade averages),
1950-2030
Over 2% annual
growth
in the rural population,
2.5%
for over 30 years!
2.0%
but now
around 1%
1.5%
and falling
1.0%
SS Africa
0.5%
S Asia
0.0%
-0.5%
-1.0%
-1.5%
Rural population growth
eventually falls below zero;
land per farmer can then
expand with mechanization
SE Asia
Rest of
World
Source: Calculated from FAOStat (downloaded 17 March 2009). Rural population estimates and projections
are based on UN Population Projections (2006 revision) and UN Urbanization Prospects (2001 revision).
An underlying cause of Africa’s
impoverishment in the 1970s-1990s
was a sharp fall in land area per farmer
Land available per farm household (hectares)
Reprinted from Robert Eastwood, Michael Lipton and Andrew Newell (2010), “Farm Size”, chapter 65 in Prabhu
Pingali and Robert Evenson, eds., Handbook of Agricultural Economics, Volume 4, Pages 3323-3397. Elsevier.
The rural population stops growing
and farm sizes can rise when
urbanization employs all new workers
Sub-Saharan Africa
1.8
8
Total
1.6
Total
7
Urban
1.4
Urban
1.2
0.4
Africa still has both
rural & urban growth
0.2
0.0
2000
2050
2040
2030
2020
1990
1980
1970
1960
0
1950
1
2010
Worldwide, rural
population growth
has almost stopped
2
Source: Calculated from UN World Urbanization Prospects, 2009 Revision , released April 2010 at
http://esa.un.org/unpd/wup. Downloaded 7 Nov. 2010.
2050
0.6
2040
3
2030
0.8
Rural
2020
4
2012
2010
1.0
1970
Rural
5
1960
2012
1950
6
1990
World (total)
9
2.0
1980
Billions
10
2000
Billions
…in Africa that won’t happen
until the 2050s
Population by principal residence, 1950-2050
Africa’s green revolution has just begun
USDA estimates of average cereal grain yields (mt/ha), 1960-2010
4.5
4.0
Rest-of-World
World
3.5
Southeast Asia
3.0
South Asia
2.5
Sub-Saharan Africa
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0
Source: Calculated from USDA , PS&D data (www.fas.usda.gov/psdonline), downloaded 7 Nov 2010. Results shown are each
region’s total production per harvested area in barley, corn, millet, mixed grains, oats, rice, rye, sorghum and wheat.
Foreign aid for agriculture has just begun to
recover after being sharply cut in 1985-99
After 1985, global food
abundance due to
the green revolution
led to complacency
about agriculture and
foreign aid
...then donors
discovered the
health sector
and rediscovered
agriculture
Source: Author's calculations from OECD (2011), Official Bilateral Commitments by
Sector, updated 6 April 2011 (http://stats.oecd.org/qwids).
The wake-up of external aid for agriculture
has been led by the Gates Foundation
Top 15 donors’ foreign aid commitments to African agriculture, 2005-2008
Rank
2005
1
IDA
2
AfDF
3
Denmark
4
United States
5
IFAD
6
Germany
7
Belgium
8
EU Institutions
9
Japan
10
United Kingdom
11
Canada
12
Netherlands
13
France
14
15
2006
300.72 IDA
152.04 AfDF
2007
538.88 United States
226.81 IDA
2008
463.07 IDA
399.16 BMGF
114.98 France
102.30 EU Institutions
141.80 BMGF
114.79 France
391.77 United States
342.42 EU Institutions
80.72 BMGF
66.88 IFAD
99.03 AfDF
87.50 EU Institutions
235.65 Canada
186.30 IFAD
66.43 United States
65.75 Japan
84.78 IFAD
66.12 Japan
122.76 France
73.36 Germany
58.42 Sweden
45.06 Germany
60.58 Korea
54.31 Germany
56.63 Belgium
56.33 Japan
43.48 Belgium
36.19 Norway
53.48 Belgium
50.34 Canada
53.20 Ireland
41.40 Norway
BMGF
32.14 United Kingdom
24.80 Ireland
30.70 Norway
22.56 Denmark
40.64 Italy
31.46 Denmark
Norway
20.80 Netherlands
19.01 Ireland
24.79 Spain
867.01
367.23
323.58
181.73
155.20
129.49
95.13
87.25
77.42
75.13
41.81
35.39
32.36
29.17
19.31
Note: Exact amounts for BMGF have been obscured because methodology differs from that used by the DAC.
Source: P. Pingali, G. Traxler and T. Nguyen (2011), “Changing Trends in the Demand and Supply of Aid for
Agriculture Development and the Quest for Coordination.” Annual Meetings of the AAEA, July 24–26, 2011.
Many African governments are now
focusing more on agriculture
Slide is courtesy of Prabhu Pingali, Greg Traxler and Tuu-Van Nguyen (2011), “Changing Trends in the Demand
and Supply of Aid for Agriculture Development and the Quest for Coordination,” at the AAEA, July 24–26, 2011.
Conclusions: Africa’s turnaround, from
impoverishment to sustainable growth
• “Africa” is 55 countries, >1000 languages, all ecosystems
– But the totals and averages can help us explain and predict each story
• Africa’s total income fell from 1980 through 2000, but is now rising
– A major cause of impoverishment was change in land available per farmer,
driven down by rural population growth which is now slowing
– Appropriate new farm technologies are finally arriving, so crop yields, output
and input use are now rising
• Investment in agriculture, food and nutrition security had shrunk to near
zero, but is now being restored
– Agriculture and food supplies had been key to cutting Asian poverty 20-30
years earlier, then seen as no longer needed when Africa become poor
– Africa is now poised for rapid change, with many opportunities for sustained
improvements – while remaining the last frontier of extreme poverty