In Cape Town, Africa heads of state, agriculture ministers and experts, and leaders from the private sector gather for the presentation of the International Fund for Agricultural Development’s Rural Poverty Report 2011 in Africa, while in Kenya leaders have gathered to address the need for scaling up sustainability through linking school feeding with agriculture development to maximize food security.

In Ghana, the realization of a long term and sustainable food security is important to the development of the agricultural sector. Ghana commits almost 10% of its annual budget to improving agriculture placing it top of the list of investors in the sector in Africa. This is according to Ghana’s Minister for Local Government and Rural Development, Samuel Ofosu Ampofo.

While addressing delegates at the Global Child and Nutrition conference in Nairobi, Kenya, Hon. Ofosu upheld Ghana’s commitment to address food security through sustainable school feeding programmes that started in 2005 following the African Union New Partnership for Africa’s Development (AU-NEPAD) recommendation to use home grown food to achieve the MDGs and address the high chronic malnutrition and low agricultural productivity.

“Through the programme, school children in public primary school are provided with one hot, nutritious meal, prepared from locally grown foodstuffs on every school going day, spending 80% of the feeding costs in the local economy”. Said, Ghana’s Minister for Local Government and Rural Development, Hon. Samuel Ofosu Ampofo.

Over 700,000 pupils in Ghana are benefiting from the programme despite challenges associated with unprecedented increase in the number of school-going children expected to rely on the programme.

Ghana’s spending on agricultural research and development more than doubled between 2007 and 2010 strategically placing it far much better than countries like Kenya.

With over 2.4 million people faced with looming food shortage due to drought and high cost of food, Kenya’s strategic reserves only maintains 500,000 metric tons of maize expected to last for the next two months. At least 675, 500 school children from semi-arid and marginalized agricultural areas are faced with malnutrition due to possible school closure precipitated by food shortage.

The World Food Programme (WFP) has send an appeal to donors for food aid to Kenya as the government cripples with the rising number of school children expected to rely on the school feeding programme.
The situation is worse in South Sudan where over two million people are already relying on food aid and number of those relying on food aid is expected to increase in the coming months as more southern move from the north to the south ahead of full independence of the South Sudan.
Smallholder farmers have been urged to boost their productivity and thereby help lead the way to economic growth and the reduction of poverty in Africa’s rural areas where crop failure remains a major concern.

Agriculture contributes to economic growth and development in Africa, this is what underpins the gathering of experts and other stakeholders in Africa to address the need for urgent measures to avert Africa’s looming food crisis.

The problems have been exacerbated by systematic failure by African governments to protect their most vulnerable rural communities through price controls, like in the case of Uganda.