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| | Preventing Food Crises |
At a seminar in February, the French Ministry of Defense's DAS (Strategic Affairs Delegation) presented its report on geostrategic prospective entitled "Quel(s) monde(s) en 2040?" (What will the world(s) look like in 2040?). One of the chapters, on the subject of "Resources and the Environment," discusses "trends" inherent to future food crises, in terms of their origins (water and food shortages), locations and impacts.
Without being alarmist, the report sizes up future risks and opens readers' eyes to the serious difficulties that may soon be facing the international community. Even though developing countries will be the most affected by the resurgence of food crises, developed countries must, for their part, be able to make fully informed decisions so as to avoid exacerbating the situation through ill-timed international initiatives or agreements. As a result, the discussions surrounding the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) with African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries, and more generally those focusing on the European Union’s agricultural policy have taken on an entirely new dimension.
World Water Day, organized by the UN on March 20, served as a reminder that one third of the human population (2.4 million people) lives without access to water of acceptable quality, and a report by the French DAS (Strategic Affairs Delegation) has asserted that "sharing potable water on an international scale will become an increasing international issue." According to Pierre Chevallier, water resources specialist at the French research institute for development (IRD), "The situation is going to deteriorate with climate change, which will accelerate the processes of evaporation and glacier melt, reducing the quantity of water available even further (…) and demographic pressure will only exacerbate the problem. In this context, the water shortage would not only affect a larger portion of the world's population, but would also threaten development of the agriculture sector in developing countries,1 which would, in turn, seriously jeopardize food security. Shrinking resources could also cause conflict within and between countries; as the DAS explains, "In the future, increased scarcity of this resource could exacerbate tensions between neighbors or lead to the use of water as an economic weapon."
Furthermore, certain parts of the globe, referred to as "vulnerable regions," would be even more heavily impacted by food crises and could become breeding grounds for conflict. These regions include those characterized by a "predominantly rural economy," generally located in Africa and Asia; regions "around large metropolitan areas" where urban sprawl would threaten outlying farms and "semi-desert regions" where the water shortage would force nomadic farmers and ranchers to leave their land and move to other more or less hostile regions already occupied by sedentary farmers.
The DAS also confirmed the direct link between food crises and migration flows. As the report explains, "Stability at the European border could deteriorate due to a lack of agricultural growth in Africa and the Mediterranean (…) Political and migratory stabilization in sub-Saharan Africa will depend on control over agricultural development. The challenge is to maintain sufficient agricultural activity to generate income and thus stabilize populations and limit migratory pressure."
Consequently, the report makes several recommendations, such as that the European Union (EU) should avoid taking a position through its agricultural policy in general, including the EPAs, that would be an obstacle to the agriculture sector in developing countries. Initially, the EPAs were intended to eliminate the preferential regime2 that the ACP countries enjoyed in trade with the EU until December 31, 2007 (free access to European markets, high customs duties) and to encourage reciprocal openness within the ACP countries' markets.
However, liberalizing trade between the EU and the ACP countries too suddenly and without any real support measures could harm local producers.3 In its report, the DAS cites the example of the cotton industry in western Africa, "which is not receiving support even though its deterioration would translate into greater migration to Europe." Migratory effects aside, the arrival of European products is making competition fiercer, causing difficulties for farmers who often have neither the financial nor the technical resources needed to compete. Eventually, certain crops (rice, wheat, pork, etc.) will be snuffed out by this approach. Furthermore, falling customs duties received for these imports will result in significant lost earnings. For Mali, which is currently part of the "Everything But Arms" initiative4, these lost earnings would total 18 billion CFA francs (or 27 million euros).
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For now, food security in developing countries is having an increasingly rough time, as illustrated by the demonstrations in Mexico against rising prices for basic products, the riots in West Bengal over food rationing and those in Senegal and Mauritania over increasing grain prices.
Despite this, the DAS points out, "Current international research is incomplete and seems to underestimate the risks of a sudden failure of the global food balance. It concludes that, in the long run, an overall balance will be reached between the planet's food production and needs." MOMAGRI is trying to combat this very notion, which completely obscures the impact of price volatility and speculation on agricultural markets. This is why only international regulation can resolve the imbalances that may otherwise drag the world down into a spiral of chaos.
momagri Editorial Department
| 1 In Asia, for example, agriculture can use up more than 85% of water resources
2 This mechanism, which was recognized as running counter to the rules of the World Trade Organization, was to be eliminated on December 31, 2007 and replaced by the EPAs.
3 Read our articles under A Look at the News: "EPAs: Protests Continue in Africa" on January 14, 2008 and "EPA: Toward a Muted AgreThe initiative provides free access for the least developed countries to European markets, with no requirement to apply the same customs duties to similar products being imported.
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