I continue to scan local and international media for news on ‘land grabs’. I’m finding the coverage is more nuanced and less breathless than it was a few years ago, but still disturbingly short on facts. Here are some of the more interesting pieces I have seen recently:
First, the Ethiopian President (not the Prime Minister) sounds the alarm over potential deforestation in the Gambella region, near the Sudan border. An Indian company wants to grow tea and coffee on 3,000 currently forested hectares. Protests to the contrary, deforesting for cash crops will lead to a substantial carbon loss. This sets uneasily with Ethiopia’s record of leadership in global climate negotiations, but in my view it’s probably less hypocritical (and a lot less carbon-intensive) than the actions of European countries when it comes to protecting their car industries.
Second, Saudi and Indian investors plan to develop other parts of Gambella for rice and sugar cane. Gambella is low, humid and has a very low population, which might make it suitable for large-scale sugar growing: but I find it hard to credit the number of jobs Saudi Star claim they might be creating. 250,000 jobs producing 1.5 million tonnes of land? That’s reasonable if they farm the land as if it’s a densely populated part of Thailand or Vietnam; much less so if it’s large-scale commercial farms in lowlands. If they can really put 300,000 hectares together (so far their trial plot only covers 25 hectares), maybe one employee per hectare is reasonable; but it still feels a little on the high side.
In any case, if they really relocate 45,000 households, which is most of the population of Gambella, is that a reasonable price to pay for a big farm? Does anyone else think the reference to ‘villagisation’ sounds a lot like what Tanzania and China tried to do in the 1970s and mercifully abandoned? Couldn’t the same amount of rice and sugar cane not be grown in smaller plots dotted around the country, in partnership with existing villagers? Slower and more expensive, maybe, but surely more sustainable and probably higher-yielding as well: as this Guardian article points out, small plots tended by their owners tend to have higher yields than large factory farms, if they get support for seeds, fertilizer and improved growing practices.
Third, a very useful analysis of large land deals (not all of them ‘grabs’) by Lorenzo Cotula of IIED. ‘Land Deals: What’s in the contracts?‘ goes into the small print of twelve deals that are available to public scrutiny, recognising there are plenty of others that are not. I was pleased to see that my former colleagues at the Ministry of Agriculture in Liberia did well, thanks no doubt in part to their top-notch legal advice and the high priority accorded by the President to getting a good deal, after Liberia’s century of experience of exploitation at the hands of plantation and mine owners. Some deals from Cameroon and Mali also stand out. Ethiopia doesn’t do so well, sadly. A summary by Oxfam’s Duncan Green is here.
I remain deeply ambivalent about these investments. I can see how they would work to benefit local people in theory; and I can see how they will almost all increase global food supply in practice. However, I worry that most will end up providing ‘development’ (i.e., increased income) for a small number of investors and their partners in capital cities, at the expense of the people whose land it originally was. Still, rather than criticise, I would prefer to challenge us all in the agricultural development field is to devise an alternative that creates jobs and returns for foreign investors, but is consistent with local livelihoods. I am thinking of an agricultural technology that isn’t just a large plantation. A form of organization that creates jobs and transfers appropriate technologies that have spillovers to surrounding farms and sectors, not just mechanised islands of excellence. Given the right kind of land use, it could be supported by carbon finance, such as REDD or CDM. Every NGO and economist (including me) complaining about the big deals should be working to promote a large-scale, sustainable alternative.
