The Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) is championing a campaign to promote African food systems and challenge the dominance of industrial agriculture on the continent, saying African should focus on supporting smallholder farmers to boost food sovereignty and security on the continent.
According to Andrew Adem, Food Systems Coordinator at AFSA, “One of the principles under food sovereignty is food comes first, trade comes secondary, so the idea is to focus on producing food for Africans, before we think of sending food outside the continent”
Adem spoke with BusinessDay on the sidelines of the conference tagged, “Transforming the African Food System to Sustainability (TAFS): My Food Is African”, holding in Dakar, Senegal, said “AFSA recognises the importance of media in shaping public discourse around food and is working to build a movement of journalists who can promote African food systems through their reporting.
“The ‘My Food is African’ campaign looks at changing perceptions of citizens of Africa about our food as African food. We are using this kind of training to build a movement of journalists, to work, train, and expose them to African food systems.”
Famara Ijeju, Programme Officer for West Africa at AFSA, emphasised the benefits of agroecology in feeding Africa’s growing population.
Ijeju said, “Agroecology can really feed the family. When we talk about yielding, let’s not just focus on one crop on the field, but let’s look at the whole farm, what are the different crops or products that are coming from there and how long they can sustain the family.”
Ijeju noted that major challenges contending against food security in Africa include undermining Africa’s role in food security and lack of support for family farming systems.
“Where they put their money is on alleged high yielding varieties, fertilizers, certified seeds, and so on. We all know that those systems, it’s like what we call under perfusion”, he noted.
Ruth Nabagala, Programmes Director at AFSA, emphasised the nutritional value of African food and the importance of promoting agroecology.
“When we talk about agroecology, we are talking about businesses whose benefit focusses beyond profits. Agroecology focusses on human health, nutrition, environmental stewardship, community benefit, not individual benefit, but community benefit, way beyond profit”, she explained.
Nabagala noted that the economic value and benefits of agroecology should be extended to everyone, including the environment, animals, and the community.
“We need quality food for nourishment and we say agroecology can nourish the bodies of the world. The focus should be on nutrition which is medicinal, nutritious, psychologically settling, and culturally accepted”, she explained.
