Population explosion: Africa is sitting on a time bomb
A response
Mr. Peter Mulira – a lawyer by profession – has written an article on Africa’s demography with the above title which appeared in New Vision (Uganda) March 31, 2010.
I would like to offer the following observations.
First, Africa’s fertility is declining albeit slowly thus lessening the scare of a ‘population bomb’ – an expression that entered the demographic discourse in the 1960s.
Second, Africa has the potential to feed many more people than it has right now given its arable land, water supplies (surface and underground) and idle labor force. The problem is that much of the food is wasted through storage, transport and processing constraints and much of the balance is exported to earn foreign currency as required under the Washington Consensus, thus leaving little for domestic consumption – pushing up prices which many households cannot afford. At the same time Africa’s agricultural productivity is very low.
Third, instead of addressing these shortcomings, a new idea has developed: Africans are being urged to sell or lease land to foreign countries and/or companies to produce food to feed people in their home countries – an arrangement if implemented will reduce food supplies in African domestic markets. The case of Madagascar is too well known to be repeated here. The reduction of food availability to African consumers will then be erroneously interpreted as population growing faster than food supplies.