Press Release
\”Africa accounts for 60 per cent of the world’s uncultivated arable land
that need to be protected against rapacious speculation\”.
The eighth African Development Forum (ADF VIII) wound up in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia, on Thursday with the adoption of a Consensus Statement suggesting
better ways in which African countries can use their natural resources to
promote people-centered sustainable development.
The 11-page document is the tangible result of the October 23-25 forum on
the theme “Governing and Harnessing Natural Resources for Africa’s
Development.
It focused on how to generate maximum benefits from the exploitation of
Africa’s lands, minerals, fisheries and forests for the benefits of the
people.
On land, which has come under intense speculative pressure from local and
foreign investors, the document calls for scientific and methodical
approaches to land issues that would guarantee transparency, equity and
sustainability.
These include strengthening policy, access, property rights, and investment
in large scale agriculture in line with the existing Comprehensive African
Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).
Africa accounts for 60 per cent of the world’s uncultivated arable land
that need to be protected against rapacious speculation.
In an open letter to Forum participants, OXFAM said some 50 million
hectares had been acquired in 700 transactions in recent years.
However, the mining sector incarnates the paradox of Africa’s natural
wealth, where bounty breeds penury. According to the Consensus Statement,
Africa ranks first or second in known world reserves of bauxite, chromite,
cobalt, industrial diamond, manganese, phosphate rock, platinum-group
metals, soda ash, vermiculite and zirconium. The continent is home to
one-fifth of global gold and uranium supplies, while over 30 countries
produce oil and gas in commercial quantity.
To resolve this dilemma, the Forum, among other measures, called for the
implementation of the African Mining Vision adopted by African leaders in
2009. The vision sets out how mining can be used to drive the development
of their countries.
According to the document, “transparent, equitable and optimal exploitation
of mineral resources to underpin broad-based sustainable growth and
socio-economic development is the major challenge for African countries
today.\”
On fisheries and aquatic resources, the Forum called for the strengthening
of policies, legislation, strategies, investment and collaboration among
states in various areas to develop the sector. Greater attention also
needed to be paid to the New Partnership for Africa\’s Development (NEPAD)
action plan on inland, coastal and marine fisheries and aquaculture at the
national and regional levels. Africa loses a million tons of fishery
resources estimated at over US $600 million annually to illegal and
unreported fishing.
The forum dwelt at length on the need for the sustainable exploitation and
preservation of Africa’s forests estimated at 675 million hectares or 17
per cent of global forests. The need for sustainable exploitation of the
Congo Basin, the second largest forest in the world, was a recurrent theme
at the gathering.
The Statement cited policy, legal, regulatory, economic, governance,
equity, knowledge, institutional and environmental constraints as critical
to the sustainable management of Africa’s forest resources with a
developmental vision.
“Overcoming these constraints is key for attaining inter-sectoral linkages
between agriculture, forest, industries and human settlement in Africa,”
the document added.
The ADF, a United Nations Economic Commission for Africa biennial event is
convened in collaboration with the African Union Commission, African
Development Bank, and other partners to establish an African-driven
development agenda that reflects consensus and leads to specific programmes
for implementation. It is usually attended by some 1,000 participants
including Heads of State and Government, African Member State
policy-makers, development partners, other United Nations agencies,
intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations (IGOs/NGOs), academia,
practitioners, civil society organizations (CSOs), the private sector,
eminent policy and opinion leaders, and the media.