Neither biofuels nor biotechnology will benefit African smallholder farmers

The World Economic Forum (WEF) will hold its annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland from January 23 to 27.

This year the forum will discuss a paper on improving African agriculture, drawn up by the Business Alliance Against Chronic Hunger. The alliance, which bands together the food giant Unilever, sportswear manufacturer Nike and express delivery firm TNT, argues that Africa is ‘‘finally poised to bring about its own Green Revolution,’’ alluding to the increased agricultural production observed in Mexico and India between the 1940s and 1960s.

It then infers that companies promoting biofuels and biotechnology could play a leading role in such a ‘‘revolution.’’ In a pilot project cited, the leading producer of genetically modified (GM) seeds, Monsanto, is aiming to increase maize harvests in the Siaya district of Kenya.

Two companies developing biofuels -- Spectre and Technoserve -- are also involved in that project. One of Spectre’s main areas of focus is in growing jatropha, a tough weed with oily seeds that can be used as a source of energy. During August, riots broke out in India, because peasants had been driven from their land to make way for jatropha plantations.

Mohammed Issah from the Social Enterprise Development (SEND) Foundation in Ghana, said that multi-national companies ‘‘are trying to capture the agriculture sector by saying they have the solution to the hunger situation in Africa.’’ Neither biofuels nor biotechnology will benefit small-scale farmers in Africa, he added.

‘‘If companies take the responsibility of providing GM seeds, then the control of planting seeds moves from farmers to multi-national companies,’’ he said. ‘‘Of course, the objective of companies getting into these areas is basically to make profits. ‘Farmers have already been using indigenous knowledge for planting material that is suitable to the environment in which they produce. What they need is support to improve the practices they already have, not the introduction of genetically modified seeds.’’

Klaus Schwab, the German-born academic who founded the WEF, acknowledged that the surge in biofuels production is one of the key issues that policy-makers will have to grapple with.

‘‘Biofuels have an impact on water management,’’ he said on January 16. ‘‘They have an impact on how we use arable land. They have an impact on food security. We have seen food prices growing substantially, leading to substantial social issues because poor people are more hit than people with higher incomes.’’

Last year, the European Union’s governments recommended that biofuels should account for at least 10 percent of transport fuels used in the 27-country bloc by 2020. But Louis Michel, the European commissioner for development aid, has recently called that objective into question. He said there is a danger that traditional farming in Africa would be damaged if biofuels are cultivated on land previously used to grow food.

Gertrude Falk from the FoodFirst Information and Action Network (FIAN) said that peasants have recently been evicted in Uganda so that palm oil can be produced from forests. Palm oil is the principal biofuel used in Europe. ‘‘Biofuels is a very dangerous issue,’’ she stressed. ‘‘It reduces the area available for food production and in the long run it drives the price of food up.’’

Regarded as one of the most influential events in shaping the international political agenda, the WEF is dominated by business leaders. Over 900 chief executives, including those from about 75 of the planet’s richest firms, are to attend this year’s event. By contrast, there will be only ten leaders of trade unions.

Top politicians scheduled to attend include Condoleezza Rice, the U.S. secretary of state, Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, Alvaro Uribe, the Colombian president, Al Gore, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and former U.S. vice-president, and Robert Zoellick, the World Bank president. The European Commission, the EU’s executive, will have a sizeable contingent there, too. Peter Mandelson and Günter Verheugen, the commissioners for trade and industry, are both expected.

It is extremely ironic, said Olivier Hoedeman from the Corporate Europe Observatory, that the fight against hunger is being championed by firms known to be in favour of liberalising world trade in a way that has been inimical to Africa’s interests.

‘‘Agri-business companies over the past number of decades have done more than anyone else to disrupt food security systems on the African continent,’’ he said, describing the Business Alliance Against Chronic Hunger as a ‘‘very cynical exercise’’ to ‘‘promote some very harmful initiatives like genetic engineering and biofuels.’’

IPS