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Agribusiness / Food in Africa

  • Tunisia harvests growth in agriculture sector

    TUNISIA, 2017/06/24 The agriculture sector in Tunisia defied the odds last season as lower trade volumes yielded larger profits, driven by higher prices for some of its core products on international markets. Revenues from fruit and vegetable exports rose by 13% during the 2016/17 harvest season, even as export volumes fell by 25%, according to the Ministry of Agriculture. While security issues in Libya, one of the major buyers of Tunisia’s food exports, pushed down agricultural trade volumes in the 2016/17 season – which runs from October to May – these were additional than offset by higher sale prices, the opening of other markets, and considerable increase in exports of onions and fennel.

  • Niger: Loans for Storing Crops Help Niger's Farmers Absorb Climate Shocks

    NIGER, 2017/06/07 Lack of storage forces farmers to sell their harvest at low prices - but changing that can help them get ahead Surveying his village's stocks of rice, sesame, millet and other food in a storehouse piled high with bags, Amadou Hassane is satisfied - but still a little anxious about the oversupply of baobab leaves. With the rainy season set to start any minute at this time in Niger, Hassane and his fellow farmers need buyers for their leaves before the rains come, driving the prices down as fresh leaves sprout and supply surges across the western region of Tillabery.

  • How to Produce More Food With Less Damage to Soil, Water, Forests

    WORLD, 2017/06/07 Massive agriculture intensification is contributing to increased deforestation, water scarcity, soil depletion and the level of greenhouse gas emission, the United Nations warns. To achieve sustainable development we must transform current agriculture and food systems, inclunding by supporting smallholders and family farmers, reducing pesticide and chemical use, and improving land conservation practices, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) director-general on May 30 said in Brussels addressing European lawmakers.

  • Morocco-EU Fisheries Agreement Respects International Law: Spanish Fishing Confederation

    CASABLANCA, 2017/05/28 The fisheries agreement between Morocco and the European Union (EU) “scrupulously respects international law,” said secretary general of the Spanish Fishing Confederation (CEPESCA), Javier Garat. The agreement, which includes specific provisions benefiting the local population, is legal and in full compliance with international law, he said during a TV program broadcast Saturday by Spain’s second state-owned television channel “La 2″.

  • Gambia: Exiled Gambian Ex-Leader Jammeh 'To Take Up Farming Full Time'

    GAMBIA, 2017/03/12 Gambia's exiled former leader Yahya Jammeh has reportedly disclosed plans to take up farming "full time". Quoting the Jeune Afrique newspaper, a BBC statement said that Jammeh was set to go into farming. An unnamed diplomat in Equatorial Guinea was cited as the source of the story, the statement said.

  • Africa: Factbox-World's Major Famines of the Last 100 Years

    BOTSWANA, 2017/03/12 People are currently starving to death in four nations, and 20 million lives are at risk in the next six months The U.N. children's agency UNICEF said on Tuesday nearly 1.4 million children were at "imminent risk" of death in famines in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen. Famine was formally declared on Monday in parts of South Sudan, which has been mired in civil war since 2013. People are by presently starving to death in all four nations, and the World Food Programme says additional than 20 million lives are at risk in the next six months. The United Nations defines famine as at the same time as at least 20 % of households in an area face extreme food shortages, acute malnutrition rates exceed 30 %, and two or additional people per 10,000 are dying per day.

  • West Africa: Farmers in Sahel Learn Ways to Avoid Drought Disaster

    BENIN, 2017/03/12 "We have some very good practices in the region. We just need support to scale them up"

  • Ethiopia: Don't Forget Ethiopia Starvation Risk, Says German NGO

    ETHIOPIA, 2017/03/12 The Menschen für Menschen charity has said 5.7 million Ethiopians could die of a lack of food. Part of the problem is that other nations are faring even worse and thus getting most of the publicity. Some 6 % of Ethiopia's people of 98 million suffers from food shortages resulting from a catastrophic drought in the eastern African country. But that doesn't qualify as a risk of famine for the United Nations, which defines the term as 20 % of a country's people having fewer than 2,100 kilocalories of nutrition per day.

  • Kenya: Govt Sets Aside Sh154mn to Mitigate Drought Effects in Schools

    KENYA, 2017/03/12 The government has set aside Sh154 million to be disbursed to various institutions to bolster the school feeding program in parts of the country experiencing drought. Education Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiangi urged the education officers to monitor the situation and ensure school heads are not stressed as a result of the effects of the drought. He maintained that teachers should not send children home and indicated that the relief food will be distributed in collaboration with the National Youth Service.

  • Zambia: Eight Die in Zambia As Food Handout Turns Into Stampede

    ZAMBIA, 2017/03/12 Some 35,000 people turned up to the event organized by a church group in Lusaka. Droughts across southern Africa have caused a sharp uptick in food prices in a country where poverty is by presently rampant. Authorities in Zambia said eight people died in the capital Lusaka next a stampede broke out during food handouts. Police spokeswoman Esther Katongo told the press that six women, one man and one boy were killed at the same time as tens of thousands turned up to the event at the Olympic Youth Development Center.
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