Agribusiness: the salve that failed to soothe.

Previously we talked about the maize shortage that plagued our nation last year. The government partly blamed it on an international food crisis that led to higher prices on imported grains. We also addressed agribusiness by noting its inadequacies to sustain food production for coming generations. In this article we will give cause as to why agribusiness is not the way forward for Kenya.
Until recently, agribusiness and large scale farming was the favored method of feeding western nations particularly America. It still is, but in the last two decades, peasant farming or sustainable agriculture has become a growing movement seeking to replace the highly chemicalized, mechanized, specialized, industrialized factory farms.
Although factory farms are efficient, they do have monumental drawbacks examples of which include:
• Topsoil depletion,
• Groundwater contamination,
• The decline of family farms,
• Continued neglect of the living and working conditions for farm laborers,
• Increasing costs of production,
• Disintegration of economic and social conditions in rural communities.
In fact, in April 2008, Sixty countries backed by the UN and the World Bank called for radical changes in world farming when they signed the final report of the UN's International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD). The key message of the report was that small-scale farmers and organic, agro-ecological methods are the way forward to solve the current food crisis and meet the needs of local communities.
And according to the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), land degradation may pose a serious threat to food production and rural livelihoods, particularly in poor and densely populated areas of the developing world. Some of the effects specific to regions would be:
• Nutrient depletion
• Agrochemical pollution
• Soil erosion
• Agriculture-induced deforestation
These are all linked to large scale food production particularly the growing of cash crops for export.
Health wise, the inordinate consumption of processed foods has led to an increase in ‘modern’ ailments such as arthritis and tuberculosis among others.
Weston A. Price (1870-1948) author of Nutrition and Physical Degeneration traveled more than 100,000 miles to study the diets and health of isolated primitive peoples in Africa, South America, Australia, Polynesia, Europe and northern Canada, at a time when such communities still existed. Wherever he found them, regardless of race, diet and climate, they were a "picture of superb health": they had superb physiques, perfect teeth, no arthritis, no tuberculosis, no degenerative diseases, and they were cheerful, happy, hardy folk.

That changed radically when he compared them to other, less isolated groups of the same peoples, charting a catastrophic health decline the closer they got to the "trade foods" produced by industrial society (processed foods grown by synthetic farming methods). He found it takes only one generation of eating industrialized food to destroy health and immunity.
What does this portend for Kenya? Since about 70% of the population lives in the rural areas, subsisting on locally grown food, we have not been affected as adversely by the effects of eating processed food. We also mainly farm following natural cycles so nutrient depletion in the soil is not as drastic as other nations that largely grow food on factory farms. We do however need to:
• Nurture the peasant farmer to produce locally for local markets thus reducing the need for imported grains.
• Encourage family farming as a counter to rural-urban migration.
• Reduce the acreage being used for cash crops and instead grow mixed crops and encourage animal keeping for poultry and meat products.
• Establish local processing plants to reduce the price of food due to transportation.
These among many other ideas may lead us to self sufficiency as pertains to feeding the nation.
The next article will address sustainable farming and organic farming as a viable option to building vibrant rural communities.
As usual reader suggestions and professional opinions are entertained.