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Sub-Saharan Africa is being sold misguided agricultural policies based on hybrid seeds and chemical inputs.
Written by Bill Moseley, a geography professor from Macalester College, this is a fantastic example of the importance of not simply using a mass-produced "one-size-fits-all" approach to economic develop and agricultural policies throughout the world. (Not so) Surprisingly, geography, place and local context matter.
This is a big deal for me, as I'm always interesting looking into the far future for humanity as a whole. It's very important that a mistake is not made with the vast agricultural power that lays in the soil of Africa. Experiments with hybrid seeds and new technologies can yield a higher production, but at a cost we are not yet fully aware of. Many years down the line it's unclear as to what the result of this sort of farming will be, and I believe the last thing we want to do is to put all our eggs in one basket with this situation, as it could yield a worst case scenario where most of earth's farmland becomes useless for the purposes of growing due to an unforeseen long-term consequence of artificial seeds and the like. We should pursue technology with all haste and push forward without fear, but we need a reliable backup in case things go wrong.
This article first tells us about the different regions in Africa agriculturally, dealing with famine, economic, and distributive conflicts. It then tells a story about the famine killing 36 million in Chins, and how they would strategically select crops from the West in attempt to produce another "Green Revolution". Experts are saying that Sub-Saharan Africa should follow in their footsteps, but the two nations have many social, economic, and especially agricultural differences.
This write-up says a lot about how nations react to situations such as famine, and the distribution of goods aside that. Different nations have different abilities agriculturally and use these toward their peoples and social crisis's.