China estimates that by 2030, when its population is expected to reach 1.5 billion, it will need to produce an additional 100 million tons of food grains each year.

New Delhi: China faces a daunting task to feed 22 per cent of the world population with only 07 per cent of the global arable land. There are 334 million acres of arable land, of which roughly 37 million acres are non cultivable.

Lesotho Prime Minister Dr Moeketsi Majoro reports that the country aims to overhaul its underperforming agricultural sector with the objective of improving both food security and attracting export-oriented investment into the production of high-value crops, such as fruit, vegetables and plant-based medicinal oils.

The Minister of Agricultural Development and Food Security, Edwin Dikoloti last week told Parliament that Botswana is making strides in living the Malabo Declaration.
Dikoloti was responding to a question from Member of Parliament for Jwaneng-Mabutsane, Mephato Reatile who had asked the Minister when government would sign the Malabo Declaration.

The Declaration is a set of concrete agriculture goals to be attained by 2025 that was adopted at the African Union (AU) Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea in June 2014 by Heads of State and Government.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock is looking at encouraging famers in the Central Province to grow cocoa in the province and boost the local economy. 

With the increased demand for cocoa beans, Minister for Agriculture and Livestock, John Simon recently announced a proposed plan to establish a big nursery at Kuriva in Central province to allow local famers to get cocoa seedlings and plant cocoa on their land. 

“There is a big potential here at Central Province which is already growing good cocoa beans here at Kuriva.

(Main photo: Indonesia - Employment in agriculture, services and industry [% of total employment]. The data is according to the World Bank compilation of development indicators, collected from official sources.)

The rate at which the country is losing farmers is a cause for concern. If it continues, Indonesia is likely to have no farmers left in 50 years. What will we eat?

Nearly 30 years after starting land reform, Namibia’s distribution of land ownership is still skewed. This is a colonial legacy. It is high time to return land to dispossessed communities. As a former colonial power guilty of terrible bloodshed, Germany should contribute to making that happen.

Main photo credit: Unsplash

Is the COVID-motivated shift enough to support all the laid-off garment industry workers? Who will really benefit?

Oxfam International warned Thursday that up to 12,000 people could die each day by the end of the year as a result of hunger linked to the coronavirus pandemic—a daily death toll surpassing the daily mortality rate from Covid-19 itself.

April saw the highest global daily mortality rate for Covid-19 thus far with just over 10,000 deaths per day.

Land reform minister Calle Schlettwein has urged regional governors to use land as a form of correcting past injustices while creating economic opportunities for disadvantaged Namibians to address inequality.

• A court in Indonesia has sentenced two indigenous farmers to eight and 10 months in prison respectively for harvesting palm fruit from land whose ownership is contested by the community and a palm oil firm, PT Hamparan Masawit Bangun Persada.
• The ruling appeared to ignore evidence showing that the villagers are the rightful owners of the land; the defendants say they will appeal and also file a lawsuit against the company.