Countries with Rapid
Population Growth and
Resource Constraints:
Issues of Food, Agriculture,
and Development
NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
This is an electronic version of an article published in
Population and Development Review. Complete
citation information for the final version of the paper,
as published in the print edition of Population and
Development Review, is available on the Blackwell
Synergy online delivery service, accessible via the
journal’s website at
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/pdr or
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com.
The contents of this article draw largely on the work of
the author commissioned by the Global Perspective
Studies Unit of the Food and Agriculture Organization
for the updating and extending to 2050 of the FAO
study World Agriculture: Towards 2015/2030, An FAO
Perspective (Bruinsma, J. (ed.), 2003).
http://www.fao.org/es/ESD/gstudies.htm
The views expressed are the author’s and do not
necessarily reflect those of, and should not be
attributed to, FAO. Useful comments by J. Bruinsma
and J. Schmidhuber are gratefully acknowledged.
Countries with Rapid
Population Growth and
Resource Constraints:
Issues of Food, Agriculture,
and Development
NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
THE LATEST UNITED NATIONS population projections to 2050 (UN 2005) indicate that the deceleration of world population growth may be even faster
than thought only a few years earlier. The medium variant projection puts
world population for 2050 at 9.1 billion. By that time, the annual additions
to global population will be 34 million persons—down from the current 76
million annually—and the growth rate will have fallen to 0.38 percent per
annum, one-third of its present level. Longer-term projections to 2300 (UN
2004) suggest that the peak of world population may be reached in 2075,
at 9.2 billion, to be followed by a slight decline and then by slow growth
again to reach just under 9 billion by 2300 (medium variant projection).1
The authors of the probabilistic projections to 2100 of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) state that “there is around an
85 percent chance that the world’s population will stop growing before the
end of the century” (Lutz et al. 2001: 543). The median of their projections
reaches a peak of 9.0 billion around 2070, followed by a slow decrease leading to a population of 8.4 billion in 2100. Their latest book on the subject is
suggestively titled The End of World Population Growth in the 21st Century (Lutz
et al. 2004a).
The realization that the world is probably on a fairly smooth path of
transition toward a near-stationary population in the not-too-distant future influences the debate on the interrelationships between population,
development, and sustainability. The notion that the trend toward an evergrowing population, the so-called population explosion, threatens our welfare and the sustainability of our existence (or, at least, the prospect that all
people can achieve “acceptable” living standards) seems to be losing currency among the public. The focus of the debate has become the implicaPOPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW 31(2): 237–258 (JUNE 2005)
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
tions of demographic trends toward below-replacement fertility and population implosion. These implications are perceived as major emerging problems in, mainly, the developed countries, some developing countries (including China), and eventually also everywhere (The Economist 2003;
Longman 2004). Naturally, the demographic slowdown and the eventual
peak of 9 billion will not be of great comfort to those who hold that the
current world population is already unsustainably large, being grossly above
the level of 2 to 3 billion considered to be in conformity with the requirements for long-term sustainability (Pimentel et al. 1999).
Leaving this larger theme aside, we may ask whether these global demographic prospects mean that the “population explosion”–related issues pertaining to food and agriculture are losing much of their relevance. In particular, will the global demographic slowdown and the eventual attainment
of zero world population growth imply that the classical Malthusian concern (that population growth will outstrip the potential of agriculture to
increase food production, and its corollary—that food insecurity is caused
predominantly by production constraints) will no longer be relevant?
The short answer is that these issues retain their full relevance, and
this for a number of reasons. Of particular importance is the prospect that
several countries, many of them with inadequate food consumption levels,
will continue for some time to have rapidly growing populations.2 A number of these countries face the prospect that their present problems of low
food consumption levels and significant incidence of undernourishment may
persist for a long time. For example, Niger, a country with scant agricultural resources barely sufficient to support its year 2000 population of 12
million, but with high dependence on agriculture for its food supplies, employment, and income, is projected to grow to 50 million in 2050.3 In like
manner, Ethiopia’s population is expected to grow from 69 million to 170
million, Uganda’s from 24 million to 127 million, Yemen’s from 18 million
to 59 million, and so on for a number of other countries.
From the standpoint of global welfare, these problems related to population growth will continue to surpass those emanating from the fertility
declines to below replacement level in many developed countries. To cope
with those declines is largely within the capabilities of the countries affected.
And, of course, one must also consider the benefits accruing to the countries experiencing these declines and to the world as a whole—for example,
in the form of reduced environmental impact and less urban congestion
(Sachs 2004).
It follows that in the debate on world food issues, the traditional
productionist paradigm (how to promote further growth in production and
the associated focus on agricultural research and technology) will continue
to reign supreme in a significant part of the world, even in the context of
the decelerating rate of growth in the global demand for food projected in
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
several studies (Alexandratos 1999; Bruinsma 2003). This conclusion stands
in contrast to the shift in paradigm in recent years that emphasizes food
quality, food safety, health and environmental impacts of food production,
consumption, and trade (Lang 2003), while downplaying the traditional emphasis on agricultural research and policies aimed at increasing productivity and production. Perhaps a more apt shift in paradigm would be from
the global to the local, a point not sufficiently emphasized in the literature
on the population–food–environment nexus, albeit with notable exceptions
(e.g., Daily et al. 1998).
Several of the countries still experiencing rapid demographic growth
have poor agricultural resources or have resources that are difficult to exploit, whether because of remoteness from population centers, lack of infrastructure, high incidence of disease, or other circumstances. Their economies are also highly dependent on agriculture, high percentages of their
gross domestic product and exports come from agriculture, and high proportions of their population depend on agriculture for a living. This combination could condemn such countries to persistent poverty if future populations were to become as large as projected and urbanization or emigration
to other countries were to provide outlets no larger than foreseen in the
demographic projections. Gallup and Sachs (2000) consider that countries
in the tropical zones have limited potential for productively absorbing more
labor in agriculture. There is a possibility, therefore, that in some of these
countries the Malthusian specter could endure at the local level, no matter
that for the world as a whole population growth may fall to zero and surplus food production potential may exist in other parts of the world. These
countries have few alternatives but to continue to depend on further exploitation of agricultural resources for their food security and survival as
well as for their overall development.4
There are 19 countries with “high” projected population growth rates
in the period 2000–2050. “High” is defined here as a growth rate of 1.8 percent per annum or higher, that is, at least twice that of the developing-country average for the same 50-year period. Their main demographic variables
are shown in Table 1, and those pertaining to food security and other socioeconomic characteristics are shown in Table 2. With the possible exception of
Mauritania, they all have serious problems of food insecurity, as evidenced
by their low per capita apparent food consumption and high prevalence of
undernourishment.5 Their rapid demographic growth can represent a serious
obstacle to improvements in food security. The historical experience of the
past four decades shows that 13 out of the 19 “high population growth” countries never achieved a national average of apparent food consumption exceeding 2,500 kcal/person/day, a level totally inadequate as a national average.6 Eight of them never exceeded 2,200 kcal (see Table 2). In some of these
countries the paucity of agricultural resources does not augur well for the
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PDR 31.2 Alexandratos-dn-EPC-sp
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21,391
6,222
11,905
6,267
7,861
48,571
65,590
15,970
11,904
10,742
8,720
23,487
2000
43,131
10,643
10,539
57,932
9,821
7,497
84,385
69,517
15,602
42,373
19,459
25,359
151,644
170,987
46,292
45,998
53,037
39,669
103,248
2050
2.50
2.25
2.09
1.83
2.41
2.08
3.09
2.36
1.84
2.54
2.27
2.34
2.28
1.92
2.13
2.70
3.19
3.03
2.96
63,227
14,590
12,927
68,365
13,523
9,754
147,217
90,433
18,785
66,221
27,836
34,619
203,341
222,326
61,689
70,823
103,241
67,690
170,014
2105
2105
2095
2090
2100
2100
2115
2095
2095
2115
2110
2105
2100
2105
2105
2110
2120
2115
2115
17,003
3,621
9,630
5,787
6,010
35,521
53,146
11,261
7,924
8,604
6,365
20,001
2000
30,369
5,138
19,762
10,783
11,062
67,566
87,624
17,425
13,291
18,408
13,366
44,190
2030
3,818 8,642 15,153
558 1,045
1,603
1,073 2,973
4,974
3,347 7,453 11,232
717 1,605
3,364
805 1,126
1,181
4,066 13,815 33,925
7,679
1,944
3,808
2,406
2,555
9,857
17,586
3,900
3,221
2,379
1,976
5,050
1950
Rural
population (000)
70
30
80
32
55
43
77
79
58
81
92
76
73
81
71
67
80
73
85
1.87
1.43
1.72
1.37
2.47
0.16
2.99
1.93
1.17
2.40
2.07
2.03
2.14
1.67
1.46
1.72
2.54
2.47
2.64
Annual
growth
rate
Percent (%)
rural
2000–
2000
30
–0.03
–0.02
0.00
–0.11
0.00
0.00
–0.25
4,148 13,838
808 3,439
1,140 3,557
5,340 25,069
824 3,066
825 2,644
4,316 17,936
43,501
13,721
11,229
63,693
10,653
7,497
59,454
–0.06 8,151 23,739 97,324
–0.20 2,005 7,198 22,123
–0.32 3,861 11,289 39,093
–0.21 2,456 6,487 25,812
0.00 2,658 8,217 31,497
–0.10 12,184 50,056 177,271
–0.04 18,434 68,538 170,190
0.00 4,230 16,191 43,508
–0.66 3,449 11,647 41,976
0.00 2,612 11,781 50,156
–0.13 2,264 7,011 21,329
–0.02 5,054 24,311 126,950
Net
migration
Population (000)
rateb from the 2004 Revision
2045–
50
1950
2000
2050
2.29
2.77
2.30
1.86
2.49
2.08
2.40
2.82
2.25
2.48
2.76
2.69
2.53
1.82
1.98
2.56
2.90
2.23
3.31
Annual
growth
rate
(%)
2000–
50
aCountries
NOTE: “High” is defined here as a growth rate of 1.8 percent per annum or higher, that is, at least twice that of the developing-country average for the same 50-year period.
are listed in two blocks. The first 12 countries have a large share (over 30 percent) of GDP originating in agriculture. The remaining 7 countries have less than 30 percent of their
GDP from agriculture (see text).
bPersons per thousand/year.
SOURCES: Cols. 1–4, 12 (UN 2003a); Cols. 5–6 (UN 2004); Cols. 7–11 (UN 2003b); Cols. 13–16 (UN 2005).
4,131 12,386
808 3,447
1,140 3,712
5,158 23,224
824 2,943
825 2,645
4,316 18,017
8,151
2,046
3,960
2,456
2,658
12,184
18,434
4,230
3,520
2,500
2,264
5,210
Afghanistan
Benin
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Chad
Congo DR
Ethiopia
Madagascar
Mali
Niger
Somalia
Uganda
Angola
Congo
Eritrea
Iraq
Liberia
Mauritania
Yemen
1950
Countrya
Population (000)
Annual
growth Peak
rate
population
(%)
2000–
Year of
50
(000)
peak
TABLE 1 Demographic characteristics of countries with high population growth rates in 2000–50
PDR 31.2 Alexandratos-dn-EPC-sp
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7
7
19
na
na
22
16
Angola
Congo
Eritrea
Iraq
Liberia
Mauritania
Yemen
1,726
1,782
1,483
1,838
1,900
1,770
1,745
1,623
1,717
1,528
1,629
1,568
1,599
1,510
1,988
1,628
1,659
1,489
2,061
2,163
2,162
1,585
3,513
2,600
2,775
2,210
2,678
2,548
2,462
2,181
2,338
2,277
1,917
2,513
2,293
2,182
2,010
2,435
2,040
2,090
1,520
2,150
1,990
2,780
2,040
1,630
2,520
2,410
1,640
2,150
1,630
1,840
2,060
2,200
2,130
1,600
2,360
40
37
73
27
46
10
36
70
15
19
68
34
71
46
37
29
34
71
19
52
17
na
42
61
22
63
98
81
94
88
87
68
na
88
90
108
53
94
49
8
na
41
48
31
32
93
74
87
91
86
80
na
95
98
93
68
96
50
3
40
27
35
28
21
67
89
89
84
90
75
85
87
93
90
59
94
UnderCereals
nutritiond self-sufficiencye (%)
(% of pop.)
2000/02
79/81
89/91
99/01
S
S
L
S
S
S
L
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
M
S
S
M
0.381
0.494
0.439
na
na
0.465
0.482
na
0.421
0.302
0.339
0.379
0.365
0.359
0.469
0.326
0.292
na
0.493
166
144
156
na
na
152
149
na
161
175
173
167
168
170
150
174
176
na
146
HDI 2002g
External
debtf
Value
Rank
C
R
yes
yes
yes
yes
R
R
C
C
L
L
L
L
L
C
L
L
C
L
Develop.
potentiali
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
LDCh
na = not available.
NOTE: “High” is defined here as a growth rate of 1.8 percent per annum or higher, that is, at least twice that of the developing-country average for the same 50-year period.
aCountries are listed in two blocks. The first 12 countries have a large share (over 30 percent) of GDP originating in agriculture. The remaining 7 countries have less than 30 percent of their
GDP from agriculture (see text).
bAgricultural GDP as % of total GDP, average 1999–2001. Source: World Bank (2003b).
cSource: FAO, FAOSTAT (http://apps.fao.org) Updated 27 August 2004. Eritrea, period 1993–02, Ethiopia=Ethiopia+Eritrea for period before 1993. Data for Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq: period
1961–2000 and average 1998–2000 from earlier FAOSTAT data.
dSource: FAO (2004). Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq data (undernourishment and calorie averages) are for 1998–2000 from FAO (2002).
eThe percentage of total consumption covered by domestic production.
fS = severely indebted, M = moderately indebted, L = less indebted. Source: World Bank (2003c).
gHuman Development Index (HDI) from UNDP (2004)—Classification of 177 countries ranging from best (HDI=0.956—Norway) to worst (HDI=0.273—Sierra Leone).
hLeast Developed Country, Source: UNCTAD (2004).
iUNIDO (2004, Tab. 1.1) classification of African countries by dominant characteristic in terms of potential opportunities in the medium term. R = resource-rich (countries receiving large rents
from export of ores, minerals, and fuels; agricultural resources not considered), C = coastal, L = landlocked.
na
37
40
51
39
56
52
30
42
40
na
37
Afghanistan
Benin
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Chad
Congo, DR
Ethiopia
Madagascar
Mali
Niger
Somalia
Uganda
Countrya
Food consumption 1961–2002
Agric.
(kcal/person/day)c
share
in GDPb
Avg.
(%)
Lowest
Highest
2000/02
TABLE 2 Socioeconomic characteristics of countries with high population growth rates in 2000–50
242
RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
prospect that agriculture can play the role expected of it and that even the
present inadequate levels of nutrition can be maintained. For example, in a
study of Ethiopia with projections to 2030, Lutz et al. (2004b: 208) conclude
that, even under their optimistic assumptions, the food security situation is
bound to deteriorate further, and “it seems that the population–environment–
agriculture nexus in Ethiopia has fallen below the threshold of sustainability.”
One may be justified in doubting whether the very large population
increases and ever-growing rural populations projected for these countries
can be sustained. This suggests that the assumptions underlying the population projections (rates of change in fertility, mortality, and, particularly,
migration—both rural-to-urban and external) may have to be revisited.7
There is a clear need for integrating the analytical assumptions underlying
the demographic projections with further variables reflecting the constraints
faced by many of these countries in supporting populations that are multiples of their present population size. As a first step in this direction, I single
out the countries with high population growth rates and examine their agricultural resources and other socioeconomic characteristics. The focus is
on signaling prima facie incompatibilities between the demographic projections and agricultural resource potentials, where the latter are considered
to be of paramount importance for development.
Characteristics of agriculture-dependent countries
with high rates of population growth
The populations of the 19 countries in Table 1 are projected to increase by a
factor of at least 2.5 (Ethiopia, Iraq) and up to just over fivefold (Uganda)
in the five decades to 2050. Naturally, not all of them face the prospect of
having to depend predominantly on their own agriculture for development
and improving food security. Scarcity of agricultural resources does not by
itself prejudge a country’s potential to make progress. Examples abound of
countries with limited agricultural resources and satisfactory food consumption and nutrition levels—notably Japan,8 but also many developing countries with mineral wealth. The latter include several countries in the Near
East and North Africa, where oil has provided the basis for much of the
growth in incomes that stimulated the demand for food while also providing the means for financing quantum jumps in food imports to meet that
demand. Yemen, another country with scarce agricultural resources and
population growth rates among the highest in the world, relied in good
measure on emigrant remittances (16.1 percent of GDP in 2001: World Bank
2003c) to finance massive increases of food imports.
For the 12 of these 19 countries shown in the upper part of Table 1,
however, a prima facie case can be made that, at this stage in their development, they have few options but to continue depending predominantly on
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
their own agriculture for increasing incomes and food supplies and creating
a basis for their wider economic development. The criterion for separating
them from the rest is that their economic dependence on agriculture exceeds 30 percent of GDP. The other seven countries have much lower dependence on agriculture, in most cases because they are rich in other natural resources.
These 12 countries exhibit the following characteristics:
1. They have low or very low food consumption per capita and high
incidence of undernourishment.
2. They depend predominantly on domestic production to satisfy their
food consumption,9 and this is likely to continue as most of them have high
external debt burdens and high dependence on foreign aid for financing their
imports. These factors would seem to preclude easy access to commercially
imported food in the foreseeable future.
3. They all rank low on the Human Development Index (HDI) classification, a composite index combining levels of income, life expectancy, and
literacy.
4. They do not derive significant rents from nonagricultural natural resources such as ores, minerals, and fuels.10
5. Most of them are landlocked—an important handicap when assessing development prospects and potentials (UNIDO 2004).
6. All of them are in the Least Developed Country category as defined
by the United Nations.
7. They have shares of agriculture in gross domestic product in the range
from 30 to 56 percent.
8. High proportions of their population (58–91 percent) are classified as
rural. Moreover, their rural populations are projected to continue growing,
more than doubling in several countries between 2000 and 2030 (rural–urban
projections beyond 2030 not available).11
These two last factors suggest that, barring unforeseen developments
(e.g., discovery of valuable mineral resources and/or successful exploitation
of existing ones), the countries’ overall development and poverty reduction
will depend predominantly on their rural—mainly agricultural—development. Therefore I next address the question whether their agricultural resources are sufficient to underpin production growth rates that would be
consonant with improvements in food security in the light of projected rapid
population growth.
Agriculture-related constraints to attaining
food security
A first glimpse can be obtained by examining the countries’ land and water
resources that have potential for producing crops, including under both
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
rainfed and irrigated conditions. The estimates of such resources come from
the Agroecological Zones study of FAO and IIASA (Fischer et al. 2002) and,
for the irrigation potentials, from FAO (Bruinsma 2003: chapter 4). The
relevant data for these 12 countries are given in Table 3. Most of the countries are far from having reached their agricultural frontiers, at least when
these are viewed at the national level. It is, however, important to note
that national-level estimates indicating no significant resource scarcities can
coexist with severe scarcities at the local level that act as effective constraints
to development. Such local scarcities are not easily overcome by the availability of resources in other parts of the country.
Among the countries with plentiful land resources in relation to their
present and projected populations are Chad and the Democratic Republic
of Congo (Congo DR). The latter country has some 190 million ha (or 81
percent of its land area) classified as suitable in varying degrees for growing
rainfed crops, although a good part of this area is under forest (closed forests cover 50 percent of the country’s total land area12). But even if we excluded land under closed forest as well as land located in protected areas,
the country still has some 58 million ha of land suitable for rainfed cereals—mainly rice and maize—at intermediate technology and even more for
roots and tubers.13 Of this land apparently only some 6 million ha is presently used in crop production, of which some 2 million ha is used for cassava and other roots, some 1.5 million ha for maize, and some 0.5 million
ha each for rice and groundnuts. These findings suggest that the solution to
Congo DR’s severe food security problems is not likely to be limited by agricultural resource constraints, even as its population more than triples to
177 million by 2050. In time-honored fashion, population growth, if persistently accompanied by poor opportunities for alternative avenues of development, will result in agricultural expansion where the opportunity for
doing so exists. Needless to say, the country’s considerable mineral resources
offer alternative development opportunities that would lessen overwhelming dependence on agriculture.14 Chad is in a similar class from the standpoint of its land/inhabitant ratio,15 while its oil resources offer significant
alternative development opportunities (Republic of Chad 2003).
The outlook is different for other countries with high population growth
rates and high dependence on agriculture. Burundi ranks lowest in terms
of the land/inhabitant ratio. Niger also has very low potential for agricultural expansion, a situation that will rapidly deteriorate if the projected increase of its population by 2050 were to materialize and alternative outlets
to lessening demographic pressure on agriculture (e.g., emigration) were
not found. The country has a land area suitable for rainfed farming of only
some 12 million ha (10 percent of its total land area), of which some 40
percent is classified as marginally suitable.16 The statistics on Niger’s land in
crop production indicate that nearly all of this area is currently farmed—
indeed overexploited, with consequent increased risk of degradation.
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3,602
9,918
20,621
1,217
35,890
187,934
40,487
33,702
27,328
11,557
3,991
13,935
Afghanistan
Benin
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Chad
Congo DR
Ethiopia
Madagascar
Mali
Niger
Somalia
Uganda
26
5,607
8,339
217
19,583
68,335
11,814
12,008
9,624
893
16
5,290
Very
suitable
213
3,536
7,188
251
6,895
58,847
12,490
9,824
8,442
2,329
296
4,590
Suitable
979
650
3,744
271
5,466
45,403
10,431
7,555
4,843
3,981
1,078
2,795
Medium
suitable
2,384
125
1,350
478
3,946
15,349
5,752
4,315
4,419
4,354
2,601
1,260
3,300
300
164
185
835
4,000
3,637
1,500
560
270
240
202
Marginally
suitable
Total
3,000
0
0
0
0
0
19
0
0
40
30
0
2,386
12
25
74
20
11
190
1,090
250
66
200
9
6,602
9,918
20,621
1,217
35,890
187,934
40,506
33,702
27,328
11,597
4,021
13,935
Of which Presently
in desert irrigated 000 ha
Land with
irrigation potentiald
0.28
1.38
1.83
0.19
4.37
3.75
0.59
2.08
2.35
0.98
0.57
0.57
2000
0.07
0.45
0.53
0.05
1.14
1.06
0.24
0.77
0.65
0.23
0.19
0.11
2050
Ha/inhabitante
Total rainfed
plus irrigation
aCountries
NOTE: “High” is defined here as a growth rate of 1.8 percent per annum or higher, that is, at least twice that of the developing-country average for the same 50-year period.
listed have a large share (over 30 percent) of GDP originating in agriculture (see text).
bPotential area suitable for any crop, including land under closed forest and/or in protected areas.
cSource: Fischer et al. (2002), detailed tables.
dSource: Bruinsma (2003), detailed worksheets.
eComputed using population from UN (2005).
fData for 1997/99; data for later years not available.
Total
Countrya
Rainfedc
Area with crop production potential (000 ha)b
TABLE 3 Land/water resources in 12 agriculture-dependent countries with high population growth rates in 2000–50
3,062f
2,255
3,707
1,092
3,050
6,098
9,483
2,778
3,622
11,106
703f
6,294
Present use
(harvested
area), all
crops, average
1999/2001
(000 ha)
246
RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
Niger’s scarce and dwindling agricultural resources and harsh agroecological environment suggest that it will be extremely difficult for local
agriculture to provide food, employment, and incomes for such a large population and also stimulate overall development. Yet alternative development
options that would significantly reduce dependence on agriculture are not
easily available, a situation aptly recognized in the country’s poverty-reduction strategy.17 Niger’s uranium-producing sector played a role in raising the pace of development in the 1970s, but then export prices collapsed
and, with agriculture shocked by recurrent droughts, development went
into reverse.18 Niger is classified by the World Bank in the category of “LowIncome, Severely Indebted” countries (World Bank 2003d: 298). It is among
the ten poorest countries in the world in terms of per capita income in purchasing power parity dollars (World Bank 2003b), and it is classified nextto-last out of 177 countries included in the Human Development Index
(UNDP 2004). The country’s dependence on foreign aid is high: such aid
accounts for 13 percent of its gross national income and finances some 50
percent of its imports (World Bank 2003b).
The indicator of agricultural land per inhabitant in Table 3 is far from
a satisfactory measure of agricultural potential and can distort country
rankings. This is because land (accompanied by climatic attributes) is a heterogeneous resource: a hectare of land in one country is not the same as a
hectare in another country in terms of production potential. This holds even
for lands classified under the same denomination used in Table 3 as concerns suitability for growing rainfed crops. For example, what is suitable
land for rainfed maize in Ethiopia (4.5 million ha at a potential yield of 4.7
tons/ha under intermediate technology) is not as productive as the suitable
maize land in Mali (7 million ha, potential yield 5.6 tons/ha under the same
technology). This is the case for two reasons: (a) the FAO/IIASA study evaluates land suitability in any given country in relation to that country’s climatic characteristics, with the consequence that identical land qualities (soil,
terrain) can have widely differing production potentials depending on climatic conditions (thermal regimes, daylight length, rainfall); and (b) consolidation of the results of the land suitability evaluations into four suitability classes is too coarse to permit comparability even among countries having
identical climates.
A more apt indicator is needed if we are to use agricultural resource
potentials as a proximate yardstick for assessing the compatibility between
the demographic projections for the countries in question and the production potential of their agricultural resources. The closest we can come to
such an estimate is to express the land and water endowments of each country as potential production of the major food crops at some future date. The
cereals group (wheat, coarse grains, and rice in milled form), comprising
fairly homogeneous food crops (grains), lends itself to this role of yardstick.
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
Cereals are by far the most important source of food in most of these countries (e.g., Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso), though by no
means in all (e.g., in Benin, Burundi, and Uganda the group roots/tubers/
plantains/bananas predominates). Table 4 shows the resulting estimates of
potential cereals production in 2050 (total and per capita) on two assumptions: (a) the proportion of total land suitable for crop production (Table 4,
col. 1) that is devoted to cereals will be the same as currently, and (b) average yields in 2050 will be double those of today.
To ascertain how credible these assumptions may be, Table 4 also shows
the evolution of these three variables (cereals area, yield, per capita production) over the last four decades (ten-year averages are used to smooth
the wide annual fluctuations typical in countries with predominantly rainfed
farming and high rainfall variability). In the ten countries with data, yields
nearly doubled in only two of them (Benin, Burkina Faso), while they grew
little or stagnated in seven others and declined in Niger. Therefore, an assumed doubling over the next 50 years is a fairly optimistic assumption,
although well within the realm of technical feasibility on the basis of presently known technology (see below). With respect to land that could be
used for cereal production, the theoretical potential appears to be large in
some countries (Congo DR, Mali, Madagascar, and Chad), fairly substantial
in others (Benin, Burkina Faso, and Ethiopia), and virtually nonexistent in
others (Niger and Burundi).
The end result is that even under the optimistic assumptions used
here, four countries would be unable to maintain in 2050 the per capita
production they achieve today (Afghanistan, Burundi, Niger, and Uganda).
For Afghanistan and Niger this inability represents a serious threat to food
security given the prominence of cereals in their diets (70–75 percent of
calories). It could be of less importance in Burundi and Uganda, where
cereals account for only 20–25 percent of calories, with much of the rest
coming from cassava, sweet potatoes, plantains, and bananas. In contrast,
the other eight countries have potential for increased per capita production, which in some cases (Chad, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Madagascar) is
well above any conceivable per capita consumption they may have in 2050.
The significant production potential presumably existing in countries with
endemic food insecurity and with largely semi-arid agriculture subject to
the vagaries of weather (e.g., Ethiopia) comes as a surprise. This outcome
justifies a closer look at the data and assumptions being used to evaluate
production potentials.
Concerning yields, the “optimistic” levels we assume for 2050 are well
within the realm of those “achievable” with presently known technologies
and crop varieties. The achievable yields are those generated by the crop
production models used to evaluate the land suitability potentials in the
FAO/IIASA study, taking into account all the agroecological parameters and
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
alternative input and land management practices. For example, the study’s
achievable rainfed cereal yields in Chad range from 2.2 t/ha on 24 million
ha (low technology variant) to 7.6 t/ha on 30 million ha (high technology
variant). These figures are well above my “optimistic” assumptions in Table
4 (yield of 1.2 t/ha on 21 million ha). For Ethiopia, the range is from 1.7 t/
ha on 32 million ha to 5.6 t/ha on 24 million ha. In this case the figure of
2.3 t/ha on 31 million ha I use in Table 4 is within the range.
Naturally, the fact that several countries have failed in the past to raise
land productivity does not imply that they cannot do so in the future. Yield
growth has been the mainstay of agricultural progress, resulting in improved
food security in most countries that have made such progress, particularly
in those that operated under significant land constraints (e.g., India). However, supportive policies, particularly those that promoted the generation
and diffusion of improved technologies (e.g., modern varieties) and policies
or other conditions (e.g., well-functioning markets) that provided economic
incentives for their adoption seem to have been at the root of such achievements. And, of course, a key prerequisite was the prevalence of agroecological conditions (e.g., potential for expanding irrigation) that permitted the
exploitation of the genetic potential of improved varieties resulting from agricultural research.
In the absence of strong proactive policies and agroecological potentials,
it is uncertain whether some form of spontaneous or endogenous “Boserup
effect” of sustainable intensification19 would play a major role in raising land
productivity at rates commensurate with the challenge posed by fast-growing populations. The evidence, particularly from the literature concerned with
resource degradation effects and loss of soil fertility associated with growing
population pressure in rural areas, is mixed. Empirical research suggests more
often than not that a host of other factors—including infrastructure development, market access conditions, and supportive policies—are instrumental in
determining the extent to which growing population pressure will be associated with progress or failure in the quest for sustainable increases in land
productivity (Pender 1999; Zaal and Oostendorp 2002).
Johnson (2000) spoke of a “political Boserup effect” that provides a
bridge between the notions of endogenous intensification and policy-supported intensification. He suggested that increases in population densities
induce governments to give higher priority to agricultural research, the results of which then lead to improved agricultural productivity. Evenson
(2004) has attempted to test this hypothesis and found generally positive
correlations between rural population densities and investments in plant
breeding in national agricultural research systems. His reported findings for
sub-Saharan Africa refer to the region as a whole, however. It is difficult,
therefore, to surmise whether they would apply equally, or at all, to the
agroecological conditions of most countries examined here, given the considerable obstacles faced in generating yield-raising genetic improvements
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6,596
8,136
20,346
1,217
33,677
116,831
39,130
32,530
26,125
10,698
3,842
13,829
Afghanistan
Benin
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Chad
Congo DR
Ethiopia
Madagascar
Mali
Niger
Somalia
Uganda
0.88
0.39
0.79
0.18
0.62
0.34
0.80
0.51
0.77
0.68
0.73
0.22
[2]
Yielde
kg/ha
Million
tons
4,868
3,153
16,158
225
20,979
39,755
31,112
16,487
20,038
7,290
2,808
3,012
2,614
2,062
1,737
2,500
1,211
1,453
2,288
2,693
1,733
677
936
2,966
12.7
6.5
28.1
0.6
25.4
57.8
71.2
44.4
34.7
4.9
2.6
8.9
131
294
718
22
807
326
418
1,021
827
98
123
70
275
116
194
46
215
27
166
200
200
329
65
139
[7]
260
104
167
48
137
29
135
180
158
265
47
133
[8]
70–
80
190
113
193
51
105
33
124
151
192
262
74
84
[9]
80–
90
93–
02
169
140
226
41
140
32
128
125
197
249
38
90
[10]
Cereal production
per capita (kg)
[12]
70–
80
[13]
80–
90
[14]
93–
02
[15]
61–
70
[16]
70–
80
[18]
93–
02
2,686
795
2,894
203
1,690
2,051
7,011
1,381
2,534
7,298
513
901 1,336
603
2,416
217
921
1,454
4,875
1,305
1,820
4,703
[17]
80–
90
Area harvested in
cereals (000 ha)
1,307
542 681 766 1,031 528 472
487 509 631 869 1,973 2,027
998 1,081 1,153 1,250 148 167
637 530 585 606 1,141 1,065
657 684 741 727 744 1,018
732 933 1,149 1,144 6,262 5,102
1,201 1,194 1,226 1,347 1,036 1,212
720 727 855 867 1,404 1,385
496 413 372 338 2,438 3,133
468
1,006 1,235 1,397 1,483 1,133 1,184
[11]
61–
70
Cereal yields (kg/ha)
Historical data (ten-year averages, rice in milled form)f
Kg/ 61–
head 70
[3]=[1]*[2]d [4]=2*[14] [5]=[3]*[4] [6]
Area
(000 ha)
Production
Potential cereal production
2050 (rice in milled form)
NOTE: “High” is defined here as a growth rate of 1.8 percent per annum or higher, that is, at least twice that of the developing-country average for the same 50-year period.
aCountries listed have a large share (over 30 percent) of GDP originating in agriculture (see text).
bArea of Table 3 (Col. 9) adjusted (on the basis of data from Fischer et al. 2002) to exclude land suitable for rainfed crops that is under closed forest and in non–forest-protected areas.
Adjustment affects significantly only the data for Congo DR (–38%) and Benin (–18%).
cProportion of total harvested land currently devoted to cereals (aver. 2000–03), assumed to hold also in 2050.
dSubject to constraint: Cereals area in 2050 £ area with potential for cereals production under intermediate technology plus irrigable desert land. Constraint binding only in Afghanistan. All the
irrigable desert area is assumed to be suitable for cereals. Production/capita for 2050 computed using the projected populations from UN (2005).
e2050 yield is assumed to be double the average of the decade 1993–2002 (ten-year averages used to smooth wide annual fluctuations).
fFor Afghanistan and Somalia historical cereals area, yields, and % of total area in cereals are for 97/99; per capita production of cereals is for 69/71, 79/81, 89/91, 97/99.
[1]
Countrya
Total
% in
(adcerejusted)b alsc
Potential area
(000 ha)
TABLE 4 Cereals production potential in 2050 in 12 agriculture-dependent countries with high population growth rates in
2000–50
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
appropriate for dryland farming in areas of often low and erratic rainfall.
No wonder that crops suitable for these areas are often termed “orphan
crops” to denote the neglect they have received from agricultural research
systems. This is not to deny that properly focused investments in plant breeding have the potential of underpinning significant improvements in food
security even in disadvantaged areas. The experience of Nigeria and Ghana
in raising food consumption levels following the diffusion of improved highyielding cassava cultivars is instructive (FAO 2000). In parallel, the potential of modern biotechnology to overcome agroecological constraints is well
recognized (e.g., Lipton 1999).
Concerning land, serious reservations have been expressed that the
land area classified in the FAO/IIASA study as having rainfed crop production potential (even after subtracting areas under forest and human settlements) is overestimated and/or that it may not be capable of being put in
cultivation in the foreseeable future. Young (1999) considers that there is
systematic overestimation of land with agricultural potential but not yet
under cultivation. Perhaps more serious factors are land accessibility (lack
of infrastructure, etc.), incidence of disease, and socio-political factors, as
the great difficulties with settlement and transmigration schemes have demonstrated in Ethiopia (The Economist 2004) and elsewhere (e.g., in Indonesia: Cohen 2000). In Ethiopia, the widespread cultivation of marginally suitable and drought-prone areas and the recurrent food shortages even in
bumper crop years20 would lead one to attribute the shortage principally to
severe land shortages at the national level. Yet, “In the lowlands, there are
large unsettled tracts of land that can be developed.… These are regions
that lack basic infrastructural facilities and pose serious health hazards” (Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia 2002). As already noted, severe land
scarcities at the local level are not easily overcome by the availability of
resources in other parts of the country.
Discussion
Demographic projections for some of the countries examined here presage
growing difficulties in combating poverty and food insecurity because of
the limited development potential offered by their agricultural resource endowments. Underlying the presumed incompatibility between demographic
destiny and agricultural resources is the notion that, for low-income countries with high dependence on agriculture, it is a sine qua non that agriculture be a prime mover in their overall development. How valid is this notion? I have noted that a good deal of consensus in the development
literature lends broad support to it. It has been reaffirmed most recently in
the United Nations report on the Millennium Development Goals: “Almost
every successful development experience has been based on a Green Revo-
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
lution at an early stage” (UN Millennium Project 2005: 32).21 However, the
issue of the agricultural resource potentials that would underpin such a role
for agriculture is not always treated as an integral part of the underlying
analyses. I concluded that, at least in some countries with high demographic
growth, there is a prima facie case for thinking that resource scarcities could
well represent serious obstacles to agriculture’s playing such a role.
We must also consider the possibility that the paradigm of the role of
agriculture as a prime mover in development may not be universally applicable. Sachs (1997) considers that the paradigm applies predominantly to
temperate zone countries and that agriculture-led growth is a rarity in the
tropics. This seems to contradict the earlier statement of the Millennium
Project quoted in the previous paragraph. Moreover, there are several examples of agricultural sectors being dynamic components of successful development in countries located partly or wholly in the tropics: for example,
palm oil and rubber in Malaysia; or coffee, sugarcane, soybeans, and livestock in Brazil—or, in any case, being dynamic components of agriculture:
for example, coffee in Vietnam or cotton in Mali. In a later article, Gallup
and Sachs (2000: 735) elaborate on the geographical disadvantages of the
tropics in relation to agriculture: soil limitations in the humid tropics, moisture limitations in the arid ones, climatic disadvantages for photosynthesis
and heavy disease and pest loads in general. The authors recognize the suitability of the tropics for perennials and tree crops, but do not consider these
to be food staples, with the possible exception of bananas. However, several tropical perennial oil crops are important food staples, for example oil
palm and coconut palm.22 Gallup and Sachs refer to the development of
lowland high-yielding varieties of rice in Asia as a major exception. I would
add that some tropical root crops—for example, cassava—are certainly staples
and have benefited from genetic improvements (see Nweke et al. 2002).
In any case, agriculture’s role in development depends on its potential
to produce incomes rather than only food staples. Some tree cash crops can
fill that role. The problem with some of these tropical cash-cum-export crops
is that they have limited market expansion potential: for example, coffee and
cocoa are mostly consumed in the industrial countries with limited growth
potential because of their nearly stagnant population and the relatively high
consumption levels already attained. In contrast, palm oil has become a star
performer in world markets (and in the agriculture of countries like Malaysia
and Indonesia) precisely because of the rapidly growing demand in other developing countries. Roughly the same applies to the sharp growth of soybean
exports from Brazil, though in this case the demand for protein-rich animal
feeds (soybean meal) has also been a prime mover. But for the commodities
with limited expansion potential, the developing exporting countries vie for
market share, with the more efficient ones (e.g., Brazil for sugar; Brazil and
Vietnam for coffee) elbowing out the less efficient and generally poorer ones.
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
In the process, oversupply and catastrophic price declines in world markets
often occur, aided, in the case of sugar, by heavy protectionism in the industrial countries.
Location in the tropics is only one of several factors associated with
adverse geographical circumstances that are increasingly cited as handicaps
to development (see Sachs et al. 2004). Being landlocked is another factor
recently used by UNIDO to rank African countries according to development potential (see Table 2). Another location-specific factor of particular
relevance to many of the countries examined here is the expectation that
“the frequency of drought is likely to continue increasing in tropical Africa’’ (UN Millennium Project 2005: 262). And some countries in sub-Saharan Africa, though not generally the ones examined here, are underpopulated in the sense that population is too thinly spread throughout rural areas
to permit efficient infrastructure development.
If for some of the countries identified here one sees little promise for
an agriculture-led development strategy (without implying that agriculture
should in any way be neglected), the natural question to ask is what one
can say about their development prospects. The interested reader will find
the latest thinking on development strategies in the recent reports of the
UN Millennium Project (2005). Such thinking applies, of course, to all countries that have failed to embark on a sustained development path, whatever their demographic outlook and resource constraints. It is well accepted
that the dominant obstacles to development are embedded in the socioeconomic, political, and policy spheres as well as in the initial conditions of
abject poverty, rather than in scarcities of natural resources. Nevertheless,
the few countries identified here as having high dependence on agriculture
and rapidly mounting population pressure on scarce agricultural resources
face additional constraints. The growing attention given to socioeconomic
and related factors does not make the resource-related constraints any less
important, at least not at this stage of development of the countries we examined here.
It is possible that future changes in key demographic variables—fertility, life expectancy, and international migration—may deviate from the assumed paths. The least desirable outcome would be for the assumed improvements in life expectancy not to be fully realized if economic
development were further impeded. Rather more certain is that pressures
favoring international migration will mount, including for cross-border migration or the wider case of the temporary movement of people to supply
labor services. This could justify upward revision of the net migration rates
in the projections (Table 1).
It is also possible that rural-to-urban migration pressures will be much
stronger than visualized in the urbanization projections. Rural poverty tends
to be transformed massively into urban poverty when circumstances dete-
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
riorate in rural areas. This could be the case under the relentless demographic pressure that would be expected to build in the rural areas of some
of the countries examined. And, as a result, the poverty and food insecurity
problem would become much more visible. The need for remedial action
would correspondingly grow more urgent and be moved up on the agenda
in the international development effort. At the same time, the concentration of people in urban areas would make interventions more feasible compared with steps required if the populations in need were to be dispersed
widely over large areas lacking infrastructure.
The growing agricultural resource scarcities in a number of the countries with high population growth are only one of many factors contributing to the persistence of food insecurity. Of greater importance is the prospect that a continued slow pace of development and/or occasional reverses
will continue to affect countries with high rates of poverty. Suffice it to note
the very low growth rate in per capita income (1.6 percent per annum)
foreseen at least through 2015 in sub-Saharan Africa as a whole (World
Bank 2005: Table 1.3). Although this growth rate would be an improvement over the dismal record of falling incomes in the past, it would still be
far from sufficient to substantially reduce rates of poverty. Even when national income growth is fairly high, there is no guarantee that it will translate, at least not in the short to medium term, into improved food consumption for the poor. The failure thus far of rapid economic growth in India
(home to a quarter of the world’s undernourished) to be associated with
any significant improvements in per capita food consumption is instructive
in this regard (Shariff and Malik 1999; Meenakshi and Vishwanathan 2003).
The possible adverse prospects for development and food security, associated with the massive increases projected for the populations of some
of the countries examined here, will probably continue to unfold in the
context of an ever-improving global food security situation. Rising proportions of the world’s population will have incomes sufficient to fully satisfy
their nutritional needs (with consequent growing prevalence of diet-related
health problems, e.g. those related to obesity). The classic food insecurity
problem will become smaller (including, eventually, slowly falling absolute
numbers undernourished) and sharply more local—hence, in principle, also
easier to address.
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Notes
The contents of this article draw largely on the
work of the author commissioned by the Global Perspective Studies Unit of the Food and
Agriculture Organization for the updating and
extending to 2050 of the FAO study World Agriculture: Towards 2015/30, an FAO Perspective
(Bruinsma 2003). The views expressed are the
author’s and do not necessarily reflect those
of, and should not be attributed to, FAO. Useful comments by J. Bruinsma and J. Schmidhuber are gratefully acknowledged. Food and
agriculture data used are from FAO’s Faostat
«http://apps.fao.org/», except when otherwise
indicated.
1 World population data for 2000 and
2050 and derived growth rates used in this article are from the just-released (in summary
form) 2004 Revision of the United Nations
Population Prospects (UN 2005). They are shown
in the last four columns of Table 1. However,
the projections to 2300 are an extension of the
2050 projections from the 2002 Revision of the
UN Population Prospects (UN 2003a). Therefore,
the peak population values shown in Table 1
(Col. 5) are compatible with those for 2050 of
the 2002 Revision (Col. 3) but may or may
not be compatible with the latest ones of the
2004 Revision shown in Col. 15. Other possible incompatibilities between the latest summary population projections and other variables used in this article are signaled in
subsequent endnotes.
2 Other reasons include the likely continuation of shifts in the structure of consumption toward more livestock products following growth in incomes and urbanization. Such
structural change will continue to influence the
total volume of demand, even if per capita
calorie intakes from all foods remain more or
less constant. For example, substituting in food
consumption any given amount of calories derived from the direct consumption of grain by
an equal amount of calories from chicken meat
would reduce direct food grain consumption
by one unit and increase indirect—feed—consumption of grain by 4 to 6 units. Several lowincome countries are far from having begun
this process of structural change. However, several formerly low-income countries have done
so, foremost among them China, and their de-
PDR 31.2 Alexandratos-dn-EPC-sp
254
mand for meat, coarse grains, and protein feeds
(e.g., soybeans) is becoming a major driving
force of world agriculture (Bruinsma 2003:
chapter 3; Alexandratos et al. 2000).
3 It would be interesting to know what
the growth rates of the different countries
would be at the time world population is expected to peak around 2075. However, the
demographic projections to 2300 (UN 2004)
show country-level populations beyond 2050
only for 2100, 2150, 2200, 2250, and 2300.
4 See ILO (2004: chapter 3) for the primary role of agriculture in the development
of such countries. According to the World
Bank, “In poor developing countries with large
agricultural sectors, growth led by the agricultural sector has a powerful effect in pulling
people out of poverty, especially when the incomes and assets of the rural sector are somewhat equal” (i.e., somewhat equally distributed—World Bank 2003a: 105). Also, “At
present, the development consensus is that a
strong performing agricultural sector is fundamental for overall economic growth” (Stringer
and Pingali 2004: 2).
5 The historical data on food consumption
per capita and undernourishment shown in
Table 2 reflect, inter alia, the data from the 2002
UN Revision. The 2004 Revision changed not
only the projections but also the historical population estimates in some countries (e.g., Niger’s
population for 2000 was 10,742 thousand in
the 2002 Revision but is 11,781 thousand in
the 2004 Revision). This could imply that,
ceteris paribus, Niger’s per capita food consumption was lower and the incidence of undernourishment higher than shown in Table 2.
6 I use the qualifier “apparent” to indicate
that the data do not come from dietary surveys or from household budget surveys but
rather from FAO’s Food Balance Sheet method
for the measurement of human consumption
of food commodities at the retail level: i.e.,
Apparent food consumption = production +
imports + beginning stocks – exports – nonfood industrial uses – feed – seed – waste (postharvest to retail) – ending stocks. As such the
data may overestimate food actually ingested,
e.g., because they are inclusive of post-retail
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NIKOS ALEXANDRATOS
and household waste. They may also understate actual consumption when they do not
account for foods not often found in national
statistics (e.g., wild meat, honey, etc.).
7 In the 2004 Revision the projected 2050
populations of Yemen and Somalia are substantially below those of the 2002 Revision.
However, the opposite is the case for other
countries in Table 1, e.g. Afghanistan, Burundi,
and Uganda.
8 Japan imports 77 percent of the cereals
it consumes; it would be importing even more
but for the high protection of its rice-producing sector.
9 Their cereals self-sufficiency ratios (the
percentage of total consumption covered by
domestic production) are in the range of 75–
94 percent, except for Afghanistan and Somalia. In contrast, the other seven countries in
Table 2 (those with less than 30 percent of GDP
from agriculture) rely heavily on imported cereals (cereals self-sufficiency ratios range from
3 percent to 50 percent).
10 UNIDO (2004) classification. Perhaps
countries such as Congo DR and Chad should
not be in that class, at least in terms of potential significant rents from nonagricultural natural resources (see below).
11 The rural population figures are compatible with the total population figures in the
UN’s 2002 Revision.
12 Closed forests are forested areas that
are more than 40 percent covered with trees
exceeding 5 meters in height (definition from:
«http://www.unep.org/geo/geo3/english/
185.htm»).
13 The areas suitable for individual crops
are, of course, overlapping—so the total area
cannot be obtained by simply adding the areas suitable for different crops. The method for
generating estimates for the total area is explained in Fischer et al. (2002) and Bruinsma
(2003: box 4.1).
14 “The Democratic Republic of the Congo
can be primarily defined by its virtually landlocked status, rather than by its potential natural-resource wealth, the justification for this being that that wealth has never been realized”
(UNIDO 2004: 8). Congo DR’s plentiful land resources, a good part of which are suitable for
sugarcane, could play a major developmental
PDR 31.2 Alexandratos-dn-EPC-sp
255
role if sugarcane were to become a major biomass feedstock for producing ethanol for home
use and for export as an alternative to fossilbased liquid fuels for automobiles. This is already
being done in Brazil, where ethanol production
from sugarcane tends to become economically
remunerative for oil prices exceeding US$35–
$40/barrel (Lebre la Rovere 2004). Environmental considerations also favor this option, as
credits for reducing greenhouse gas emissions
under the Kyoto Protocol may eventually translate to monetary incentives for sugarcane-based
biofuel production.
15 “Almost one third (30 percent) of
Chad, 39 million ha, could be used to grow
crops. However, each year, only approximately
2.2 million ha (5.6 percent) are used for that
purpose. Some 5.6 million ha could be irrigated
but today only 7,000 ha are. In other words,
the country’s farmland resources are hugely
underexploited” (Republic of Chad 2003: chapter 3).
16 Niger’s national data give potential arable land as 15 million ha (Government of
Niger 2002: 77). “As a result of drastic climatic
constraints, intense population pressures, reduced soil fertility, and difficult access to inputs and farming equipment, today the acreage under cultivation has doubled, farming
has shifted toward ‘marginal’ lands in the
North, and pasturelands have shrunk. Degradation of natural resources such as water,
farmland, pastureland and forests has also
gone a long way toward making populations
more vulnerable. All these factors have led
to the near-pervasive impoverishment of land
capital, the dwindling or disappearance of fallow land, overexploitation of wood resources
and overgrazing, which have accelerated the
process of desertification” (Government of
Niger 2002: 36).
17 “The high concentration of the population of Niger in the rural areas (85 percent
of the population lives in the rural areas, and
at least 80 percent of that number is involved
in agriculture) shows clearly that the rural sector must constitute the main growth engine
in the short and medium term. Indeed, the agricultural sector alone accounts for 40 percent
of the GDP of Niger. Agriculture must therefore serve as a springboard for economic
growth in the rural areas” (Government of
Niger 2002: 60).
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RAPID POPULATION GROWTH AND RESOURCE CONSTRAINTS
18 “The well-being of the people of Niger
is dependent upon several external factors—
the world uranium market, rainfall, Nigeria’s
economy, and donor financing.… There are
strong economic links—especially in the rural
sector—with Nigeria, whose 100 million
people are a vital market for Niger’s products.
Much of Niger’s male rural population migrates
each year to Nigeria to complement income
from cropping and livestock activities” (World
Bank 1996: 20).
19 Boserup (1965) held that increasing
demographic pressure on land is a prime factor driving agricultural intensification, e.g., by
reducing fallow periods in shifting agriculture.
In a sense, in this view technological change
is endogenous, triggered by increasing population/resource ratios (Turner and Shajaat Ali
1996).
ment Mission to Ethiopia estimates emergency
food aid will be required in 2005 for 2.2 million “acutely food-insecure people” despite a
bumper crop of cereals and pulses (the highest ever) estimated for 2004/05 (FAO 2005).
21 The primacy of agriculture is increasingly recognized in the development strategies
of several low-income countries. For example,
Ethiopia’s most recent Sustainable Development and Poverty Reduction Program submitted to the IMF makes “agricultural development led industrialization” a cornerstone of its
strategy (Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia 2002).
22 Vegetable oils are a prime factor in the
improvement of per capita food (kcal) consumption in the developing countries (Bruinsma
2003: chapter 3).
20 The latest (December 2004) FAO/
World Food Programme Food Supply Assess-
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