April 2011 - Centre for Civil Society - University of KwaZulu-Natal

(Patrick Bond is with the University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil
Society in Durban
We export food to import food
Nebiyu Eyassu First Published in Pambazuka 23 April 2011
Nebiyu Eyassu cuts through the supposed benefits of foreign agricultural
investments - so-called land grabs - for a country like Ethiopia. Far from
boosting employment and local food security, land grabs are likely to prop
up a discredited government and increase hunger.
In recent years there has been an upsurge of agricultural investment in the
developing world. Its alleged purpose is to curb the recent global food
crisis that has seen serious volatility in the global food market system,
causing significant price hikes on key global foods, such as rice.
The price hike in global food has prompted certain countries to seek cheap
and fertile farmland beyond their borders in order to guarantee food
security for themselves. To achieve this goal such states are encouraging
their domestic agro-businesses, tied to their national interests, to invest in
countries like Ethiopia, Sudan, Madagascar, Tanzania and Argentina, to
name a few. Capital invested in far-away farms will produce food cheaply,
which will then be exported back to the country where the original capital
came from. In this way, the volatility of the international food market can
be avoided and national food security achieved.
To accomplish this goal, a key step is to convince developing nations to
give up their fertile land to foreign investors. One of the baits designed for
the purpose of persuasion is the promise of infrastructure and the sharing
of information and technology in agricultural science. The other promise
made to host nations is of capital gained from food exports, which can
then be reinvested in the country. For underdeveloped countries, who face
serious food insecurity, and who are often unable to feed their population,
this may sound too good to pass by, particularly if host nation governments
are too naive, or are otherwise unconcerned.
In Ethiopia, we have had hundreds of foreign investors grabbing fertile
land at incredibly low cost. The scale of the spree is unprecedented.
Investors are describing the deal as ‘green gold’. Ethiopia’s untilled land,
located in some of the most fertile parts of the country, is now being sold
to foreign interests for less than its true worth. Foreign investors are given
perks, tax holidays lasting years, and essentially they are exempt from any
royalties.
The government of Ethiopia promises this process will mitigate the
nation’s chronic food insecurity and allow domestic farmers to gain
knowledge from the expertise of foreign agro-business. It also says dollars
gained form exporting food can alleviate Ethiopia’s endemic food crises.
By this analysis, the premise of the EPRDF government seems to be ‘we
export food to import food’. Leaving aside the initial absurdity of the
claim, it is necessary to note that the inadequacy of this argument has
been amply demonstrated in many developing countries.
Although this issue of land-grabbing by foreign interests is new to Ethiopia,
it is no stranger to other parts of the developing world. The history of