The Sunday Mail
More than at any other time in recent history, Africa is now keenly aware not only of its vulnerabilities, but the urgency with which it must extricate itself from unhealthy dependence on other continents for both its sustenance and development.
The twin tragedies of the coronavirus pandemic and conflict in Eastern Europe, which disrupted supply chains and consequently led to shortages of key commodities in developing countries, exposed the folly of disproportionately depending on imports for survival.
At the height of the pandemic, when countries were desperate to secure vaccines for their own populations, Africa was unsurprisingly muscled out of the way and relegated to the back of the queue by rich nations which hoarded the life-saving medicines for their own people.
It was a disaster that was long in the making.
Africa heavily imports pharmaceutical products to support its healthcare needs. It is estimated that between 70 percent and 90 percent of drugs consumed in Sub-Saharan Africa are imported.
And while the continent represents about a quarter of global demand for vaccines, it only produces 0,1 percent of the world’s vaccines.
Overall, more than 75 percent of pharmaceutical imports are sourced from the European Union, India and China. All this cannot be healthy for Africa, as it haemorrhages billions from economies and negatively impacts on prices of medicines for poor countries. Unfortunately, it is the same when it comes to food security.
The Russia-Ukraine conflict led to heightened anxieties for most countries on the continent as they relied on these two countries for their needs.
The African Development Bank (AfDB) actually projects that Africa now faces a shortage of at least 30 million tonnes of food, especially wheat, maize and soyabean, as a result of the war.
What makes the situation worse is the fact that fertiliser prices have risen by more than 300 percent, making it increasingly difficult for farmers to grow enough agricultural commodities.
“Africa is struggling to mitigate a conflict-induced famine that could throw some 30 million Africans into catastrophic levels of food insecurity,” said AfDB president Dr Akinwumi Adesia.
And in a recent interview with foreign news agencies, he also critically noted: “Africa should not allow itself to be vulnerable in excessively depending on others, whether it is for vaccines or whether it is for food.”
It is exactly what the Second Republic has been doing for the past four years. Way before Covid-19 and ongoing hostilities and upheavals in Europe set in, Government, through elaborate plans encapsulated by the 18-month Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) — which ran its full course by December 2020 — and its successor the National Development Strategy, had already begun rolling out a plan to achieve food security and self-reliance through increasing local production and promoting industrialisation.
It is not, therefore, fortuitous that the country has of late managed to register record crop output for maize and wheat. A record winter wheat crop is expected again this year.
All this success can only be the result of careful planning and sustained support for the sector. Owing to budgetary support from Treasury and indefatigable efforts from the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development, President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s vision to put 200 hectares of land under irrigation in every district is gradually coming to life.
In the livestock sector, nothing could have been more encouraging than last week’s news that the Department of Veterinary Services had started to manufacture vaccines for tick-borne diseases that have depleted the national herd.
Two vaccines for babesiosis and anaplasmosis are already being produced, while a third one for theileriosis is in the experimental phase.
Critically, as expressed by visiting Botswana President Mokgweetsi Masisi while officially opening the 112th Zimbabwe Agricultural Show in Harare last week, there is scope for Harare and Gaborone to further co-operate in the production of livestock vaccines.
“I have no doubt that we can leverage on each other’s strengths in areas that we enjoy a comparative and competitive advantage in the agriculture space, with a view to further deepening collaborative efforts in this area,” he said.
“One such dominant niche area is the production of a number of livestock vaccines, which my country is already undertaking for a number of vaccines and supplying Zimbabwe and, indeed, the region and beyond.”
This is the tonic that Africa needs to develop.
There is now need to take advantage of bilateral and multilateral support facilities that are being provided to Africa to increase its capacity to grow enough food for the continent’s 1,3 billion people and become self-reliant. In May, AfDB established the US$1,5 billion African Emergency Food Production Facility that is tailored to deliver climate-adapted certified wheat and other staple crop seeds, and access to fertilisers to 20 million farmers. At the recent eighth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD 8), Japan also unveiled a US$300 million facility for agriculture.
We can potentially tap into these resources to add impetus to the highly successful programmes that are presently underway. In essence, what is happening in the pharmaceutical sector and agriculture tells us what we must do as Africans to shape a sustainable and prosperous future.
We really need to stop buying and start producing.
