The current food crisis and the associated growth in global demand for biofuels offer Africa an important growth opportunity (ECA/AU, 2009). World food prices are already falling from their 2008 peak but are not expected to return to their low and declining pre-crisis levels. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and FAO expect world food prices to stabilize at about 30–40% higher than before, which, while providing some welcome relief to the poor, will also make agricultural investments more attractive than before. The challenge is whether African farmers will be able to achieve significant supply response to take advantage of the new opportunities offered by the changing global landscape for food.
The main objective of this article is to review the situation of food production in Africa and some of the conditioning factors that have implications for global development policies. The article discusses the changing domestic and global landscapes of agriculture that are currently impacting African agriculture, including global development finance, domestic support to agriculture, inequity in global policies of support for agriculture, foreign direct investments, “land grabs,” climate change, and the evolving carbon markets. The article ends with concluding remarks on how to better shape global development policies to enable African agriculture to play its role in helping to feed itself and the rest of the world.