In Geneva this week, Akinwumi Adesina, the head of AGRA, the Rockefellar and Gates backed organization with a mission to bring a new "green revolution" to Africa was speaking. He described how the green revolution that had success in India did not get a foothold in Africa because of it was unsuitable for rainfed farming and diverse agro ecosystems.
He went on to describe how agriculture failed in Africa due to structural adjustment programmes combined with a downturn in assistance. SAPs removed some of the distortions and biases against agriculture (e.g. overvalued exchange rate) but they also led to an abandonment of support. The private sector was too weak to fill gaps. Farmers were abandoned.
This echoes similar finding of work by Andrew Dorward at SOAS who says that missing markets and high transaction costs characterize rural economies in Africa due for example to the removal of state marketing boards and withdrawal of extension services.
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