A Green Revolution program meant to increase agricultural yields and help feed starving people in Africa has failed miserably, and critics are calling for the billion-dollar program to end.
Founded by the Bill & Melinda Gates and Rockefeller foundations, hundreds of university graduates in crop breeding spent 16 years “helping” farmers use commercial fertilizers and seeds to increase food production. The bottom line, however, according to PoliticoPro, "is the aim to get African farmers to use more synthetic fertilizers."
But now, with poverty still entrenched in the continent and farmers “at the mercy of volatile global markets," Gabriel Manyangadze of the Southern African Faith Communities Environment Institute s idemanding that the green revolution program end.
While a Gates Foundation spokesperson insisted the program “is playing a critical role in helping countries implement the priorities and policies contained in their national agricultural development strategies,” a Rockefeller spokesperson likened the situation to lesson “we can take into our future world.”
So far, however, the ag group’s response is to stop mentioning fertilizers so much and instead promote the commercial seeds they want the farmers to use.
SOURCE:
PoliticoPro September 13, 2022