Last year Angola earned 48 billion US dollars from petroleum. Yet the country that was once Africa’s largest agricultural producer is reduced to importing food. Now the government and private investors want to develop the agricultural sector, in the hope that Angola could become a new Brazil. But will there still be room for small-scale farmers?
The research aim is to detect land cover changes of Bangladesh using satellite remote sensing technology. More specifically the research objectives are to a) quantify how the availability of agricultural land has evolved since independence; b) quantify how the availability and allocation of land to various uses has evolved at national and sub-national levels since independence; and c) quantify land lost and gained due to various factors.
There are 1.4 billion poor people living on less than US$1.25 a day. One billion of them live in rural areas where agriculture is their main source of livelihood. The ‘green revolution’ in agriculture that swept large parts of the developing world during the 1960s and 1970s dramatically increased agricultural productivity and reduced poverty. Many of the productivity gains accrued to smallholder farmers, supported through research and extension services.
In recent years, Zambia has witnessed increased interest from private investors in acquiring land for
agriculture. As elsewhere, large-scale land acquisitions are often accompanied with promises of capital
investments to build infrastructure, bring new technologies and know-how, create employment, and
improve market access, among other benefits. But agricultural investments create risks as well as
opportunities, for instance in relation to loss of land for family farmers. While much debate on ‘land
The Southern Africa Food Lab (SAFL) and the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies at the University of the Western Cape (PLAAS) are engaged in a project called Supporting Smallholders into Commercial Agriculture: A social dialogue and learning project. This project has been designed to ensure strong linkages between academic research and processes of social dialogue, policy debate, media dissemination and institutional learning among stakeholders involved in the development of smallholder agriculture. This report documents the proceedings of the first innovation lab.
Wild foods are an integral component of the household food basket, yet their quantified contribution to food security relative to other sources in the context of HIV/AIDS, climate change and variability remains underexplored. This study was carried out in Willowvale and Lesseyton which are rural communities in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa.
The rubber tree is native to the humid tropics and has traditionally been cropped in the equatorial zone between 108Nand 108S; in mainland Southeast Asia this includes portions of southern Thailand, southeastern Vietnam, and southern Myanmar. In the early 1950s, the Chinese government began to invest in growing rubber in environments perceived to be ecologically marginal and eventually established state rubber plantations in areas that lie as far north as 228 north latitude.
In the last two decades, the best agricultural lands in Bolivia have been put into commercial production by large-scale producers closely linked to foreign investors, particularly Brazilians. Foreigners now control more than one million hectares of prime agricultural and ranching lands in Bolivia, primarily in the eastern lowland department of Santa Cruz, an important agroexport region dominated by transnational corporations and what has been termed “trans-Latina” corporations or TLCs.
How should African politicians respond to the ‘land rush’? Parliamentarians from the member states of the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) met in mid-November to debate this question. Includes a collective response to agriculture and food security is needed, what land deals are underway in Central Africa?; investment and production, but for which markets?; impacts of land deals on Africa farmers; can Africa help secure the world’s food supply?; transparency isa precondition for inclusive investments; what should be done?
La presente Ley declara de prioridad nacional la protección de áreas de cacao silvestre y el fomento a la producción de cultivos agroforestales de cacao, con el fin de promocionar la producción, industrialización y comercialización del cacao. El fin último es garantizar la soberanía y seguridad alimentaria enmarcados en las políticas nacionales del Vivir Bien.
One of the most wellknown biofuel investments was that of Bioshape, which acquired approximately 34,000 ha in Kilwa District for the cultivation of jatropha.
Theme 1 of community videos: Agriculture and Food Security
