South Africa has just hosted the 46th Ordinary Southern African Development Community (Sadc) Summit in Durban. The themes discussed at the summit by regional leaders included infrastructure, agricultural development and critical minerals.
The focus on agriculture reflects a clear understanding that the sector can aid economic progress in several countries across Southern Africa. But the development of agriculture will require changes to the domestic policies of the various countries. Aside from South Africa, many countries in the region still have weak land governance, with informal land tenure dominating their agricultural activity.
Moreover, inadequate public infrastructure across countries means that agricultural value chains remain weak, limiting the scope for agribusinesses to invest. The reluctance of various governments to register certain seed cultivars and agrochemicals also contributes to the low agricultural productivity observed in the Sadc region.
A policy shift on this could help to boost agricultural productivity in several Sadc countries. This would also be a key step toward addressing the food insecurity challenges many countries in the region typically struggle with.
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Notably, the Southern Africa region is approaching an El Niño event, which increases the likelihood of drought. While the world doesn’t have seed cultivars that are impervious to drought, advancements in research over the years have led to seeds that perform reasonably well in harsher climatic conditions.
This means openness to science would have put the various Southern African countries in a better position to continue producing a decent harvest even during seasons of below-normal rainfall. We have witnessed such gains in South Africa where, for example, the maize industry consistently performs better than other countries in the region during droughts.
The major differentiating factor is the type of seeds that are used. For seed suppliers to provide such inputs there must be a change in the policy posture of the various governments in the region to embrace scientific advancement to cope with changing climatic conditions and support agricultural development.
Another important theme of discussion in agriculture and the food industry is openness to trade. The Sadc region must continue to internalise the need to advance food security through trade.
Trade restrictions
Over the past few years we have seen instances of trade friction in Southern Africa involving South Africa and its neighbouring countries. For example, Namibia, Botswana and Mozambique have at various points imposed restrictions on imports of agricultural products from South Africa.
The common factor in all of these import restrictions is that neighbouring countries say they seek to boost domestic production. Another issue is that some countries incorrectly claim that their slow penetration of the South African agricultural and food market is due to restrictions.
South Africa’s agricultural market is relatively open, and all of these countries are part of the Sadc Free Trade Area. The slow penetration is typically due to some of their products not being competitive in the South African market.
South Africa is a large food market, spending more than $7bn annually on imports. But the main food products the country imports are wheat, rice, palm oil and poultry. Countries in the region do not usually have surpluses of these products and therefore can’t export much to South Africa.
The Sadc region’s spotlighting of agriculture at its summit is to be welcomed, but meaningful reforms in agricultural matters will have to be driven by individual governments. The gains from such reforms will also not be swift, even though they are essential for long-term growth and to address food security challenges.
The region must also reaffirm its focus on free trade and discourage the sort of protectionist interventions in agricultural markets that we have observed from various member countries in recent years.
• Sihlobo is presidential envoy on agriculture and land, chief economist at the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa and a senior fellow in Stellenbosch University’s department of agricultural economics.
Business Day
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