(AbejeZenebe)
It is known that Ethiopia has over 72 million hectares of arable land out of which only 14% is used for cultivation so far. Ethiopia is also the water tower of North-east Africa where it exports over 122 billion cubic meters of water to neighboring countries along with two million tons of forest soil.
Nonetheless, the last century has seen the suffering of the Ethiopian people through major famines or food shortages, so much that the words has become synonymous with the name of our beloved nation. Nevertheless, Ethiopia is slowly emerging out of this legacy. It has managed to avoid a nation-wide famine for nearly two decades, thanks to a responsible policy of engagement with the early warning and response systems.
Therefore, we explored existing challenges and opportunities for food insecurity so as to leave the legacy of famine and hunger behind has been the priority of this government for the past two decades. These include inter-alia sustained peace and better early warning and response systems, increases in agricultural production and incomes, improved market infrastructure and information flows, and the establishment of the Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP). Nonetheless, further steps are needed to reduce the likelihood of national and sub-national hunger in the future and to reduce chronic and transitory food insecurity.
This direction has delivered much progress. According to FAO estimates, Ethiopia is one of the best performers which won recognition from FAO for outstanding progress in fighting hunger, an achievement which includes reaching international targets ahead of the end-of-2015 deadline. Indeed, Ethiopia has been named this year as one of the countries that have reached the MDG-1 hunger target, alongside Gabon, the Gambia, Iran, Kiribati, Malaysia, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico and the Philippines.
As FAO’s director put it, Ethiopia have overcome major challenges in difficult global economic conditions and policy environments and have demonstrated the will and mobilized the means.”
Indeed, the government’s committed leadership and policy directions realized these results. As the UN State of Food Insecurity in the World 2014 (SOFI 2014) report stated, several critical factors drive the success achieved by countries in reducing hunger. Chief among these is transforming political commitment into effective action.
In several countries – including Ethiopia – the achievement of the internationally established goals is attributable to economic growth and the policies put in place by governments over the last two decades. Social protection program aiming to provide immediate relief to vulnerable population groups have complemented interventions in agriculture.
In this regard there had been a couple of transformative programs. For example: the Commune Development Program (CDP) designed to meet five major objectives, which are: enabling the communities dispersed in various parts of the regions to join together to establish a central village for sustainable and stable way of life; facilitating access to basic development services and amenities to the people; raising the livelihoods of the communities that are totally dependent on cattle raising to a more productive semi-pastoralist stage; ensuring food security and enabling the people partake in the benefits of sustainable development and of good governance.
The larger and extensive program, nonetheless, is the Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP).
The Productive Safety Net Program aims to shift away from a focus on short-term food needs met through emergency relief to addressing the underlying causes of household food-insecurity. The Project is expected to contribute to the reduction in the number of Ethiopians suffering from extreme hunger, malnutrition, and poverty and to the rehabilitation of the environment by strengthening soil and water conservation, making agriculture more productive and sustainable.
The Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP) in Ethiopia was set up in 2005 by the government as part of a strategy to address chronic food insecurity. The PSNP provides cash or food to people who have predictable food needs in a way that enables them to improve their own livelihoods – and therefore become more resilient to the effects of shocks in the future. However, there are times when a shock results in transitory food insecurity, the scale of which is beyond the mainstream PSNP to address. This requires additional temporary support. In this event extra funding comes from the PSNP’s Contingency Budget and, when that is exhausted, the Risk Financing Mechanism (RFM). The RFM allows the PSNP to scale up in times of crisis, and is designed to reduce the ‘typical’ timeline for humanitarian response, so that households receive assistance before a crisis makes itself felt. As the RFM is part of the PSNP, it can only be implemented in existing PSNP districts.
Despite these pivotal efforts, however, a bad news was heard recently
Delayed seasonal rains are causing livestock loss and risk of food shortage in some parts of Ethiopia especially in the Afar and Ethio-Somali Region.Due to under-performance of two consecutive rainy seasons (Belg and Meher) the food insecure people dependent on relief food assistance (2.9 million people at beginning of the year) is expected to increase significantly.
According to an update released by FEWS Net (Famine Early Warning System Network):
“Belg-producing areas in Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’ Region (SNNPR), northeastern Amhara, southern Tigray, and some areas in central and eastern Oromia will be in Crisis (IPC Phase 3) from July to September while areas in southern Afar and Sitti (formerly Shinile) Zone of northern Somali Region will be in “Crisis” (IPC Phase 3!) Only with the presence of humanitarian assistance through at least December.”
“Poor households in SNNPR, northeastern Amhara, southern Tigray, and some areas in central and eastern Oromia will be “Stressed” (IPC Phase2!) from October to December. While Southern Somali Region, with the presence of humanitarian assistance, will have a large majority of households able to address their food and nonfood needs and be in “Minimal” (IPC Phase 1!) from October to December.”
.Subsequently, a Joint Government and Humanitarian Partners’ Document “Humanitarian Requirements Mid-Year Review 2015 document was released which has revised its previous projection of the number of relief food beneficiaries to 4.5 million.
According to the document, the number of nutrition hotspot “priority 1 woredas”doubled from 49 to 97 in the last four months. The revised total funding requirement for 2015 now stands at USD 312 million. Of which, USD 157 million is expected from donnors.
The earlier document published in January had identified 2.9 million relief food beneficiaries and USD 281 million for multi-sector humanitarian response.
“Differing from the forecast at the beginning of the year, the onset of thebelg/gu/ganna/sugum rains was delayed and ceased earlier than normal. The rains were erratic and inadequate in amount negatively affecting water and pasture availability and reducing belg harvest. Unseasonal livestock migration and livestock deaths were reported in pastoral areas. Consequently, food insecurity deepened and malnutrition rose in affected areas”, the document elaborated.
These developments were chilling to Ethiopians and friends of Ethiopia. However, this setback doesn’t tell the whole story of how far we have come from the state we were in.
Since the introduction of the policy of Agriculture Development Led Industrialization (ADLI) as the direction of Ethiopia’s economic development framework, the agriculture sector has been identified as the most important economic sector. Ensuring food security by reforming the land-hold system and increasing agricultural productivity has been the central aim of the government. The historic abject poverty in rural Ethiopia and the resulting social and political instability was taken as an existential imperative and it put the government’s focus back on agriculture, the mainstay of the country’s economy and on rural Ethiopia where more than 85 percent of the population resides.
Among Ethiopia’s still largely untapped natural resources fertile land and water are perhaps the most visible. In almost all regions of the country vast tracts of arable land, across multiple climatic zones suitable for a wide variety of crops and produce, have been left unused. The reasons for this have included such elements as the old settlement patterns that favored certain areas, misguided policy directions, a political climate that failed to prioritize development or encourage investment and a lack of capital. The abundance of water that led to the country being called the water tower of Africa has not helped to improve the situation. In addition to the underdevelopment of lands across the country, the dismal level of agricultural productivity was not even enough to provide for food self-sufficiency.
More recently, things have begun to change. Considering its vast potential and its status as a livelihood provider for nearly the whole population of the country, the present government which came to power in 1991, found it only logical to take agriculture development as the foremost priority in its development policy. It has been consistent and clear in pursuing a policy that puts agriculture development and productivity improvement as the most necessary preconditions for overall economic growth and social development.
The EPRDF-led Transitional government observed the level of foreign aid dependency and the root factors for the low level of growth in the agriculture sector.
The 2003 Rural Development Policy and Strategy is one of the main documents which spelt out the new government’s determination into implementable programs. Its components, as highlighted in EDRI’s ESSPII document, were:
“The policy concentrated on broad areas of agriculture-centered rural development and elaborated in some detail the strategies for enhancing labor-intensive agricultural production systems, improving access to land to farmers and pastoralists, promoting diversification and specialization of production in various agro-ecological zones, rehabilitating natural resources in drought-prone areas, and enhancing productivity in adequate rainfall areas. Among the areas of strength of the policy document are the importance attached to improving the health of the rural labor force and the urgency in equipping the rural youth with the necessary skills so that they become a driving force in modernizing Ethiopian agriculture. The document further expounds the opportunities that exist for enhancing food security, which is a major determinant in nutrition security.
“….further strategies and programs have been designed and are being implemented since the launching of the policy document. These include disaster prevention and preparedness through Disaster Risk Management, the Food Security Program, AT-VET Program, Agricultural Research Systems, establishment of Higher Learning Institutions, Agricultural Growth Program, and the Growth and Transformation Plan.”
According to the analysis presented by Ethiopian Academy of Sciences:Between 13 and 17 per cent of government expenditure (equivalent to over five per cent of GDP) has been channeled towards agriculture in recent years – far more than the average for sub-Saharan African countries and well in excess of the CAADP minimum. About 60 per cent of agricultural investments are funded from the Government budget, 30 per cent from grants, and 10 per cent from concessional loans.
“While more than half of this expenditure supports chronically food insecure households under the DRMFS Programme, investments are also directed towards expanding the extension system, irrigation development, and rural commercialisation and agro-processing.
The government is complementing its efforts in food insecure areas with an increased commitment to raise food production by investing in areas with high agricultural potential, including efforts to attract private agricultural investment.”
The achievements are too big to deny. Ethiopia is no more the country that was hopelessly plagued with food insecurity and chronic malnutrition.
In the late 1980s, Ethiopia was producingless than150 kilograms ofcereal per person. The level required for a minimum subsistence diet is approximately 240 kilograms per person per year, according to FAO. For the sake of comparison, let’s take Niger: Only 20 percent of Niger’s land area receives enough rain for un-irrigated farming to take place, yet it produced an average of 330 kilograms per person per year between 1960 and 1990 at least double Ethiopia’s output at that time.
As the National report submitted to the United Nations, last year, noted:
Ethiopia has implemented policies, and programs vital to the agricultural sector. The integration of disaster prevention and preparedness operations has successfully ensured food security for 76.2 million people. The area covered by the major crops has increased from 13.16 million hectares in 2009/10 to 13.69 million hectares in 2011/12.
The production of major crops has increased from 202.46 million quintals in 2009/10 to 232.44 million quintals in 2011/12. The average productivity of the major crops increased from 15.38 quintals/hectare in 2009/10 to 17.0 quintals /hectare in 2011/12.
In the last fiscal year, Ethiopia registered a 10 percent increase in crop. The Central Statistical Agency (CSA) report also stated that 254 million quintal yield is expected this fiscal year from 12 million hectares of land. That was 23 million quintals increase from previous year’s produce on almost the same amount of land.
In terms of malnutrition, the National Nutrition Survey conducted in 1992 had depicted that the prevalence of stunting (64%) was the third highest in the world after Bangladesh and Mauritania.
However, that has changed in the past decade as Ethiopia has been making progress towards improved food and nutrition security. Consistent and comparable data collected since 2000 have shown that malnutrition, as measured by stunting and underweight rate of prevalence, have decreased by more than 10 percentage points per year over the 10 year period.
Therefore, in 2009/2010, the total land covered by the main crops rose several folds to 11.25 million hectare, while agricultural productivity reached to 270 million Quintals.The average productivity of the main crops has increased from 12.1 to 17 Quintals per hectare. The foreign currency required from both agricultural and industrial products reached $1.45 billon US dollar.
In 2011, the first year of the GTP, the overall growth rate of agricultural value added was 9 %. The total volume of production of major food crops (cereals, pulses and oilseeds) registered in 2010/11 was 221.8 million quintals. This exceeded the production level of the previous year by 19.36 million quintals. The average productivity of major food crops during the same period was 16.5 quintal perhectare, which is 1.12 quintal/ha higher than the productivity in 2009/10 and 1.0 quintal/ha less than the target for the same year. The land covered by these major food crops was 13.45 mln ha.
The recent report of the GTP confirmed that the progress is on track. In the last fiscal year, Ethiopia registered a 10 percent increase in crop. The Central Statistical Agency (CSA) report also stated that 254 million quintal yield is expected this fiscal year from 12 million hectares of land. That is another 23 million quintal increase from previous year’s produce on almost the same amount of land.
Indeed, Ethiopia’s progress has received praises from various corners.
For instance; The Africa Progress Panel (APP), which consists of ten distinguished individuals who advocate for equitable and sustainable development for Africa, under the chairmanship of Kofi Annan, former Secretary-General of the United Nations and Nobel laureate, made its independent assessment of Ethiopia’s agricultural development and gave exultant testimonies.
The Africa Progress Panel (APP) panel’s report clearly demonstrates that Ethiopia is not only growing but also making it in an equitable manner that REALLY changes the lives of the farmers.
In its 180 pages report, the Panel wrote, regarding the fairness of the wealth distribution:
“…examples of countries where growth has succeeded in reducing poverty are revealing. Ethiopia halved the national poverty rate between 1995 and 2011, from 60 per cent to 30 per cent.
That reduction was achieved through broad-based economic growth, with agriculture making a major contribution, increased and more equitable public spending, and the development of labor-intensive manufacturing.
The success of Ethiopia can be traced in no small measure to the role of agriculture.”
Indeed, Ethiopia’s policy directions have been proved correct time and again. While the temporary climatic challenge is a saddening and alarming phenomenon, the fact remains that Ethiopia’s fight against hunger is on the right track. Accelerating its pace and scaling up its coverage is the way to eradicate hunger from the face of Ethiopia for once and all.