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Corporate Agriculture’s False Promises in Africa
With Anne Maina, National Coordinator, Biodiversity and Biosafety Association of Kenya
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) was founded in 2006 to give new impetus to the fight against hunger on the continent through a corporate-driven “Green Revolution”. It promised to double the agricultural yields and incomes of 30 million small-scale food producer households by 2020, thus halving both hunger and poverty in the focus countries. To achieve these goals, AGRA received over one billion US dollars—mainly from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, but also from the US, UK and Germany. The results have been disappointing, to say the least: yield increases for key staple crops in the years before AGRA were just as low as during AGRA. Instead of halving hunger, the situation in the 13 focus countries has worsened since AGRA was launched. The number of people going hungry has increased by 30 percent. We’ll be joined by Anne Maina, National Coordinator of the Biodiversity and Biosafety Association of Kenya, to learn more about AGRA’s track record and the dubious role of corporate agriculture around Africa.
See all past episodes here.