2015 Africa Workshops

Could current agricultural business methods spell disaster for African communities? This workshop will address small-scale food producers and large contract farming. It will critique the dominant development paradigm of “agricultural value chains” with practical examples from sugar out-growers and oil palm plantations in Africa and impact on local communities. We will reflect on how poverty is driving this trend and ways to engage in land grab prevention.

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Many African nations are beefing up their military spending. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, military spending in Africa increased overall by 8.3 percent in 2013, reaching an estimated $44.9 billion. Between 2004 and 2013 Algeria’s military spending increased by 176% to over $10 billion; Angola’s 36% in 2013 to overtake South Africa as the largest military spender in sub-Saharan Africa. How can we assist African countries to invest their valuable resources in education, health and agriculture and life giving programs rather than on instruments of death?

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The Ebola epidemic that afflicted some West African countries with great loss of life and economic devastation is symptomatic of a larger problem. The three countries most affected by the epidemic – Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone – lost about $1.5 billion each year to corporate tax evasion, corruption and external debt payments in the decade preceding the outbreak. Guinea spends more money servicing debt than on public health. How can we tackle the root causes of this affliction and change the economic policies that trap people in cycle of poverty?

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