By Alister Doyle
OSLO Oct 9 (Reuters) – Wheat production in sub-Saharan
Africa is at only 10 to 25 percent of its potential and nations
can easily grow more to limit hunger, price shocks and political
instability, a study showed on Tuesday.
The report, examining environmental conditions of 12 nations
from Ethiopia to Zimbabwe, said that farmers south of the Sahara
grew only 44 percent of the wheat consumed locally, meaning
dependence on international markets prone to price spikes.
“Sub-Saharan Africa has extensive areas of land that are
suitable for profitably producing wheat under rain-fed
conditions,” according to the study by the non-profit
International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center.
It said countries in the region were producing only between
10 and 25 percent of the amounts that the Center’s research
suggested was “biologically possible and economically
profitable” with a net return of $200 per hectare (2.5 acres).
The 89-page study, issued at a wheat conference in Ethiopia,
said it aimed to identify ways to raise wheat production as “a
hedge against food insecurity, political instability and price
shocks.”
“Wheat is not an African crop, it is not a tropical crop
(but) many governments want to produce wheat locally instead of
paying for imports,” Hans-Joachim Braun, director of the
Center’s global wheat program, told Reuters by telephone.
The report estimated that African nations would spend about
$12 billion to import 40 million tonnes of wheat in 2012,
particularly for fast-growing cities. More wheat should not be
grown at the expense of other more viable crops, Braun said.
Continued…
