Plantations, women, and food security in Africa: Interrogating the investment pathway towards zero hunger in Cameroon and Ghana

Lotsmart N Fonjong,Adwoa Y Gyapong

doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105293

Lotsmart N Fonjong, Adwoa Y Gyapong

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105293

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Abstract

In this paper, we critically engage with SDG-2- Target 2.3 and SDG-5 to examine how and why large-scale agricultural land acquisitions modify the social relations of women’s food access. Adopting qualitative methods and from agrarian political economy perspectives, we assess the implications of plantation investments on food security and gender equality in Cameroon and Ghana. The study draws on the impacts of various plantation schemes in Cameroon and Ghana to argue that the current all-encompassing framing of the SDG-2, whereby support for small-scale production appears to co-exist with the promotion of corporate-led agricultural investments, tends to create a vague interpretation of food security, even when capitalist motives override the interests of rural working men and women. In both countries, plantations have been characterised by displacement, reduced food production and competition over land resources in rural contexts where women bear the burden of social reproduction, particularly in subsistence and food provisioning for their households. Restricted access to farmlands hampers petty commodity production, and provokes rural exodus among farming populations in Cameroon who compete with pastoralists for land; and in the Ghana case, where settlers and migrants compete with dispossessed indigenes for arable lands. The study shows the inherent contradictions and tensions within the narratives of sustainable development and projects which are considered as potential pathways to the SDGs. One of such tension areas is between local food security- which is a gendered role for women in West/Central Africa – and the accumulation imperatives of capitalist investors. We iterate that achieving zero hunger requires gender-inclusive land and labour policies that recognise, protect and empower small farmers and women, and create opportunities for local and national food self-sufficiency.

Highlights

Africa remains the most targeted region for large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) by foreign and national investors in the global South
In highlighting the importance of the agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers in achieving zero hunger (SDG-2), the paper underscored the need to integrate the gender dimension (SDG-5) in current plantation-led LSLAs by ensuring that women’s interests are mainstreamed into important decisions that take away their land and farms which have been the sole source of family livelihood for ages
Gender equality cannot continue to serve as window dressing for the pursuit of corporate interest in Africa. It behoves on agro-companies to provide decent working conditions; ensure gender equity in labour opportunities; and invest in the local food economy, if the goal is to achieve zero global hunger for all

Summary

Introduction

Africa remains the most targeted region for large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) by foreign and national investors in the global South. Over 3 million hectares of agricultural land concessions; 2.2 million in Cameroon and 1.1 million in Ghana have been acquired for biofuels, forestry, food crops, oil palm, and rubber, mostly for exports (Land Matrix, 2020)2 This ongoing rush for land in Africa has heightened debates on land tenure governance, rights to land, issues of dispossession, and sustainable development. Context matters, and as we show in the subsequent sections, the food security implications in Cameroon and Ghana are strongly linked to both the accumulation logic of capitalist production and policy shortcomings. This situation undermines the underlying gendered nature of local resource ownership and production systems that define production and food security. The emphasis on women’s experiences in securing their households food security amidst the increasing capitalist enclosures for plantations, contribute to knowledge, alternative policy pathways and in the light of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which calls for reduced inequalities between men and women in the access to resources

SDG-2: A political economy of food security and social reproduction

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