Decline in food production- cause for concern

By Cindy Witten
24 November 2008

The amount of food produced in the country has decreased significantly in recent years. Many factors have contributed to this decline, such as climate change and bio-fuel production, where natural resources are used rather to produce fuel instead of being harvested as food.

Jennifer Chiriga, co-ordinator for civil society capacity building at the Southern Africa Trust says that more should be done to stop this decline in food production.
“I think there should be more investment in agriculture, because 70% of the Southern African population, which is a huge proportion of people who are dependent on agriculture as the main source of employment. There must be investment aligned to national budget,” said Chiriga.

According to her, SADC heads of state agreed that 10% of national budget would be targeted to agriculture investment.
“That’s a very important factor,” she added.