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The African Journal of Food and Nutritional Security Vol. 1, No. 1, 2001, pp. 1-2
Guest Editorial Prof. James E. Otiende Nairobi, Kenya Code Number: fn01001 In 1998 the Friends-of-the-Book Foundation (Friends) made a proposal to the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA) to support the publishing of three issues of the journal annually, The African Journal of Food and Nutritional Security (AJFNS). Most African countries have a food deficit due to a poorly developed agricultural infrastructure, diminishing agricultural land, droughts and imprudent policies which encourage food imports. This has stagnated agricultural development. yet Africans must consider the provision of food and nutritional security a priority, if she will claim for any stake in the new millenium. The journal is instrumental in continuing informed discussion towards the search for solutions to the African food and nutritional security conundrum. All Africans should at all times be able to access an adequate quantity and quality of nutritious food for active and healthy lives. Indeed, this is the agenda of the journal being inaugurated. To realize this goal requires creative and pragmatic approaches to the persisting, yet, surmountable food and nutritional insecurity, occasioned by the reasons already alluded to. In effect, the question of the African Renaissance can only be meaningful if it is stretched to its limits to produce tangible results. Certainly, this calls for teamwork, involving all concerned parties including key players, such as the scientific and business communities as well as the public and private sectors. From its inception in 1998 to 2001 when the inaugural volume of three issues of the journal are finally off-press, has not been a short time to wait. Nevertheless, both Friends and CTA firmly believing in the relevance of prioritizing food and nutritional security for the development of Africa have patiently worked and waited in the hope of making some modest contribution to the debate towards alleviating the food and nutritional insecurity on the continent. In this particular issue and those to follow, an attempt will be made to underpin the agenda of the journal in both the manner of its presentation and selection of articles. This issue therefore provides for consideration of strategic perspectives, such as review articles, technology notes, new R & D papers, and book reviews. The six articles included in this issue of The African Journal of Food and Nutritional Security were specially selected to give readers an insight into the different aspects of the context, forces and processes, which currently shape food and nutritional security in Africa; including the rest of the Third World. Accordingly, under strategic perspectives, Odhiambo calls for a modernized African science-led sustainable agriculture which critically puts food and nutritional security at the core. Under review articles, Sekitoleko continues the debate by calling on Africa to exploit her vast untapped agricultural potential, so as to rekindle the moribund African economies. This, he suggests, is to be done by putting in place sound agricultural policies in order to reduce the number of chronically food insecure people on the continent. The point is that most African economies are agriculturally-based; steam-rolled by agricultural production and exports. On his part, Haddad wants food aid to be redefined so as to reinvigorate African development directly through for example, food-for-employment-based programmes rather than giving hand-outs, which only serve to perpetuate food and nutritional dependancy. Both Toure and Noor further maintain that the spectre of food and nutritional insecurity in Africa can be overcome through the deployment of environmentally-friendly technology in agriculture. In short, the modernization process will be propelled by research and extension, involving the public and private sectors as well as the agricultural community, if sustainable economic growth, food security and equity are to be realized. Under technology notes, Chuzel offers an overview of the cassava-based industrial production in Brazil which itself, is Third World country. The case of processing cassava in Brazil demonstrates how a single food industry can bring about major socio-economic changes if only the small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) could access scientific and technological information, including resources to establish R & D services as would happen in the developed countries. Finally, K'Okul, under new R & D papers, analyses whether the low quality of life in rural Western Kenya is due to hunger or HIV/AIDS. In this study he concludes that severe thinning complications caused by malnutrition and other chronic diseases could be mistaken for HIV/AIDS, particularly if such a pronouncement is based on the Elisa and Western Blot methods whose results are less reliable than the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), which is DNA-based. There are indeed, many issues which are central to the chronic food and nutritional insecurity in Africa, which have not been delved into in this issue. However, in the meantime, the debate has certainly thus far progressed, and will no doubt continue to be the focal point of future issues. Indeed, the articles here offer the reader sufficient glimpse into the intricate issues holding back Africa and the Third World, from being food and nutritionally secure. If readers are challenged to reflect on the prevailing food and nutritional situation in Africa and hopefully resolve to act, then this journal would have served to further one critical agenda of the new millennium.
Prof. James E. Otiende Nairobi, Kenya Copyright © Quest and Insight Publishers and Friends-of-the Book Foundation, 2001 |
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