Community | December 22, 2010 | 13 comments

African Farmers Displaced as World Investors Move In

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/22/world/africa/22mali.html

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twohawks
Across Africa and the developing world, a new global land rush is gobbling up large expanses of arable land. Some condemn the deals as neocolonial land grabs that destroy villages, uproot tens of thousands of farmers and create a volatile mass of landless poor. Making matters worse, they contend, much of the food is bound for wealthier nations.

I highly recommend reading the whole articel, it is eye-openingly informative.


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SOUMOUNI, Mali — The half-dozen strangers who descended on this remote West African village brought its hand-to-mouth farmers alarming news: their humble fields, tilled from one generation to the next, were now controlled by Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, and the farmers would all have to leave.

“They told us this would be the last rainy season for us to cultivate our fields; after that, they will level all the houses and take the land,” said Mama Keita, 73, the leader of this village veiled behind dense, thorny scrubland. “We were told that Qaddafi owns this land.”

Across Africa and the developing world, a new global land rush is gobbling up large expanses of arable land. Despite their ageless traditions, stunned villagers are discovering that African governments typically own their land and have been leasing it, often at bargain prices, to private investors and foreign governments for decades to come.

Organizations like the United Nations and the World Bank say the practice, if done equitably, could help feed the growing global population by introducing large-scale commercial farming to places without it.

But others condemn the deals as neocolonial land grabs that destroy villages, uproot tens of thousands of farmers and create a volatile mass of landless poor. Making matters worse, they contend, much of the food is bound for wealthier nations.

A World Bank study released in September tallied farmland deals covering at least 110 million acres — the size of California and West Virginia combined — announced during the first 11 months of 2009 alone. More than 70 percent of those deals were for land in Africa, with Sudan, Mozambique and Ethiopia among those nations transferring millions of acres to investors.


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......anger and distrust run high. In a rally last month, hundreds of farmers demanded that the government halt such deals until they get a voice. Several said that they had been beaten and jailed by soldiers, but that they were ready to die to keep their land.

“The famine will start very soon,” shouted Ibrahima Coulibaly, the head of the coordinating committee for farmer organizations in Mali. “If people do not stand up for their rights, they will lose everything!”


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####### GO READ THIS VERY INFORMATIVE ARTICLE ########

African Farmers Displaced as Investors Move In
By NEIL MacFARQUHAR
Published: December 21, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/22/world/africa/22mali.html
  1. groups:
    Community,   News and Politics,   Green,   Sustainable Agriculture
  2. tags:
    Africa,  Economics,  Agriculture,  Industry,  2 more
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13 comments // African Farmers Displaced as World Investors Move In

  • alexandrek
  • twohawks
    • 0
      twohawks  
    • alexandrek:

      Appreciate your finding / viewing this news article and commenting, Alexandrek.

      There is so much going on there during this last year, and so many of us are simply oblivious to the issues in Africa-- with no consideration, or simply without any validation, for how our involvement, say with consumerism (to name 1 thing), is having such a tremendous impact of the lives of the greater population there.

      If you found this by searching here, try to find those posts from around aug-Dec regarding blood minerals ...there's some really important legislation that was passed and went into almost immediate effect (around that time) in US, Canada, and some major Euro-nations that is all tied in.

      I find it most interesting that after the turn of the year, and all that international legislation going into effect, suddenly the bottom fell out in central-east Africa (adjacent to the DRM), followed by all the uprising in neighboring arab nations we are witnessing in flux.

      I don't find many people paying much attention to what is going on there. Usually when something is brought up about it I witness rolling-eyes and angry 'could care less' banter, including things like... "those people gotta figure it out", "there's nothing going on here that is having any connection to their problems over there", "been going on for years", "we gto bigger fish to fry at home", "who gives a f--k about over-breaders" (so what's your point.. kind-a-thing)
      ....I mean... this coming from otherwise seemingly conscious and good people - I find it unreal!... how callous, insensitive, presumptuous, arrogant, unaware, and stupid (to mentino a few) people in the States are - so full of themselves, and so oblivious and could-care-less as to how their lives are connected to and influencing lives elsewhere.

      BTW, Are you one of the new folk migrated from the AOL buyout thing?
      Welcome to Current ;^)

    • 1 year ago
  • Animal_Chin
    • 0
      Animal_Chin  

    • "Look on the bright side, it won't be long before you can watch new commercials featuring Sally Struthers & opt to send them less than a cup of coffee a day to feed them! How awesome is that? That way the corporations that stole their land do not have to fork over any of their vast profits to feed them!" ~ Professor Sarcasm

    • 1 year ago
  • DogBoy
    • +1
      DogBoy  

    • We need folks that can organize the little farmers into organic agricultural co-ops in developing countries so that the UN can't say commercial farming techniques are better suited to feed and meet the agricultural needs of a country. It's as though groups of people and cultures in developing countries always need to provide a value for the greater good or be regarded as just another useless tool.
      just as the governments of the developing countries need to get control of their own natural resources for the good of each countries population before they get exploited by the wicked. There just doesn't seem to be enough good thinking folks in the world that can and will act responsibly on behave of the real interest of their people.

    • 1 year ago
  • DogBoy
    • +2
      DogBoy  

    • The World Bank and organizations like them serve their masters. They are tools. like consumers are a tool for capitalist.

    • 1 year ago
  • maasanova
    • 0
      maasanova  

    • This is why I say "bullshit" when over-population theorists say that there are too many people in the world.

      There are only too many rich psychopaths telling us that there are too many people and that we need to come in and take your land.

    • 1 year ago
  • DogBoy
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • DogBoy
    • 0
      DogBoy  
    • MrMxyzptlk:

      Yes the people that appear insignificant to the powers that be will always get raped.This is a terrible crime to Humanity. We learn little from our history. Greed and power close minds.

    • 1 year ago
  • MrMxyzptlk
  • DogBoy
  • JanforGore
    • +1
      JanforGore  

    • This is one reason why I am also not keen on the REDD mechanism. How many indigenous people will be displaced due to the buying up of forests by the very corporations/banks deforesting other swaths of land to pollute, build mega dams, grow GMOs for animal feed and ethanol instead of food, etc,. while they continue to get away with spewing GHGs here? It seems to be a very skewed unfair way to protect the environment without really protecting it or those affected by it.

    • 1 year ago
  • DogBoy
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