AGRIBUSINESS: DOES IT GO FAR ENOUGH TO SUSTAIN THE ECONOMIES OF AFRICAN COUNTRIES? While it is a laudable idea for African countries to seriously embark on agribusiness on the continent for the sake of ensuring food security, does agribusiness by itself go far enough to sustain the economies of African countries? This question has become significant in the wake of the increasing widening of the economic gap between poor nations and rich nations globally. In the African context it does to a great extent create jobs and further ensures food security on the continent at a time the population growth rate on the continent seems to be getting out of hand. In terms of sustaining the economies of Africa, it falls short of totally accomplishing the task. Instead embracing the adoption of value addition/value capturing technologies and ensuring export diversification platforms could be the panacea to the economic problems facing developing countries. This simply means African governments should fully embrace the processing of the bulk of all natural resources before their sale on the international market or massive industrialization on the continent . Africa definitely needs to industrialize to stem the ever widening gulf between Africa or developing countries on one hand and Industrialized countries (developed countries). That means Africa should adopt/embrace value addition methodologies and value capturing methodologies and not only process raw materials before their sale on the international market but also have export diversification platforms. Unfortunately, agribusiness by itself which is a vital component of the Value Addition process does not go far enough to fully boost African economies. Value addition encompasses four critical stages: production, processing, transporting and marketing. Each stage does not only enhance the value of the product or service but most importantly creates jobs for the local/national economy. This may involve depending on the country: the processing of farming products, fishing products, mining products, drilling products, food gathering products, forestry products, hunting and quarrying. While agribusiness confines itself to agriculture, Value Addition on the other hand covers the processing of all natural resources including the production of agricultural products which are vital to the sustainability of every economy. That also means Africa should refocus on the production of high-tech goods instead of low tech goods which have been the mainstay of African economies. My research has proven that adding higher value to natural resources before their sale creates jobs because of its inherent “multiplier effect”; it enhances the flow of foreign exchange, it boosts and stabilizes the local economy; it diversifies the economy; value added goods or industrialized goods value more on the international market than raw materials which when exported have the tendency of creating jobs elsewhere at the expense of African countries; value addition or industrialization extends the “shelf life” of processed goods unlike selling them raw, it can boost food security which is a problem on the African continent and finally it enhances indigenous technology and could open the floodgates for the award of patents to African countries. This is a win win situation. My research has further proven that there is a direct link between the sectoral distribution pattern of the labor force/GDP and an overall GDP creation in the economy where a slimmer labor force/GDP in the primary sector and the subsequent increase in the labor force and GDP creation with progression from the secondary to the tertiary sector resulted in phenomenal cumulativeGDP growth per nation (Botchwey, 2012). Industrialized countries have more buoyant economies as a result of diversified economic platforms and Africans can follow suit by embarking on an aggressive industrialization process. Finally, diversified economies in general have the capacity to easily absorb global economic shocks which in the past have been catastrophic to fragile economies in Africa and the developing World in general. For more details check these links:https://wwwbionomicfuel.createspace/3753615amazon/dp/1475155298amazon.it/dp/1475155298amazon/-/e/B008MMY74S or [email protected]
Posted on: Mon, 10 Jun 2013 01:23:10 +0000