Food and Water Security

The absence of a U.S. response to China’s encroachment on Asia’s rivers points to a failure to comprehend the regional implications of increased competition for water resources.

Sub-Saharan Africa is urbanizing at the fastest rate in the world. Western commentators, notably McKinsey in its 2016 report “Lions on the Move II,” see rapid urbanization as increasing the continent’s p roductivity. McKinsey states, “urbanization has a strong correlation with the rate of real GDP growth,” and that “productivity in cities is more than double that in the countryside.” Other observers, however, question whether urban infrastructure—especially water and education—can meet the needs of an exploding population. The Financial Times recently published a balanced report on the pros and cons of rapid African urbanization. It focuses on Bamako, Mali, as an example of the continent-wide phenomenon. It cites a World Bank estimate that Bamako’s population today, at 3.5 million, is 10 times larger than it was at independence in 1960. A professor at the University of Bamako comments that that the city’s growth is a “catastrophe foretold,” that “Bamako is a time-bomb.” Among other shortcomings, the professor notes that the city lacks a land registry even as real estate booms. The exploding population growth translates into high land prices that encourage corruption. Peppered through the Financial Times piece are arresting statistical notes. For example, a World Bank economist observes that Africa is now 40 percent urban with a per capita GDP of $1,100. By the time Asia reached that level of urbanization, its per capita GDP was $3,500. Statistics about Africa are generally weak, but for frequent travelers to Africa, the explosion of the urban population is obvious. So, too, are the slums, the lack of schools, water shortages, and unpaved roads. Unemployed male youth are ubiquitous and do, indeed, constitute a potential time bomb with respect to political instability. Experience shows that urbanization cannot be reversed, as few residents are willing to return to the countryside unless compelled to do so, as occurred in Chairman Mao’s China or Pol Pot’s Cambodia. But no African state has comparable means of repression should it wish to reduce its urban population. African urbanization will continue and public authorities having few tools with which to manage it.   

A devastating drought that has placed severe restrictions on water usage in South Africa—particularly in the Western Cape province, its capital Cape Town, and the neighboring Northern Cape—has captured U.S. attention. There are several reasons for this, among them the fact that Americans are more familiar with South Africa than with other parts of Africa due to tourism as well as business and cultural links. The drought also is evidence of the deleterious effects of climate change. With regard to climate change, Cape Town is almost a dress rehearsal for what rapidly growing American cities in the Sun Belt, such as Los Angeles or Phoenix, could face in the future. In 2017, Western Cape Premier Helen Zille declared her province a disaster area because of the drought. In March, the ruling African National Congress’ minister for cooperative governance, Zweli Mkhize, declared a national state of emergency. However, with the arrival of winter rains, Mkhize decided not to renew the state of emergency when it expired on June 13. The weather is finally improving. In May, South Africa’s late autumn, more cold fronts than usual pushed across the Western Cape, bringing rain. The South African Weather Service expects “slightly above normal” rainfall this winter season. Water levels in dams around Cape Town are also improving. In early June they were at 32.1 percent of normal capacity, compared to 29.8 percent the week before and 20.9 percent a year earlier. The largest dam in Western Cape, Theewaterskloof, is at 21.5 percent of capacity. Weather experts caution that the welcome rain has not officially broken the long drought. According to the National Drought Coordinating Committee, however, the acute phase of the drought in Western, Eastern, and Northern Cape has ended. It suggested the region is now entering a “resilience building” phase, where officials will focus on adapting to water scarcity exacerbated by climate change. Like the Los Angeles and Phoenix metropolitan areas, Cape Town’s population has been growing steadily over the past decade and a half, adding over a million people from 2001 to 2016 to reach just over four million. The city is wealthy, with a per capita income close to $16,000, and there has been improvement in the quality of township housing, albeit from a low base. However, the city’s water use has increased as precipitation levels have decreased—this is the new reality to which Cape Town, and many other cities around the world, will need to build “resilience.”

A historic dry spell has severely affected Cape Town's water supply, and global climate patterns suggest that other cities may face the same fate.

Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia are close to armed conflict over a Nile dam project; so far the United States is ignoring them.

The very tight race between Uhuru Kenyatta and his Jubilee Party and Raila Odinga and the National Super Alliance (NASA) reflects growing food insecurity that, in turn, is the product of drought, which may also be related to climate change. Spring rainfall is down 75 percent from the its five-year average, bringing Kenya’s staple food crop, maize, down 70 percent from its five-year average, according to the UN Food and Agricultural Organization. In response to the drought, food prices are much higher than normal. According to local observers, the price of maize flour is up 50 percent, milk is up 12 percent, and sugar, 21 percent. Food agencies estimate that 2.6 million of 48  million Kenyans are now “food insecure,” with estimates that the number could increase by one million by August. In certain remote areas, food agencies are describing the situation as “one step away from famine.”  The incumbent Kenyatta administration has introduced price controls on maize flour and lifted tariffs on imported maize. The opposition, NASA, sees these steps as too little too late. It is also critical of alleged white-elephant prestige projects, general corruption, and government policies that benefit big farmers and millers, often with close ties to Jubilee. Election Day, August 8, will show the extent to which voter anger at high food prices is directed at the Kenyatta administration. As the incumbent, Kenyatta would normally be the favorite, not least because of the administration’s patronage networks. But that advantage could be undercut by the price of maize.  

This is a guest post by Michael Clyne. Michael is a risk management consultant specializing in Africa. You can follow him on Twitter at: @mikeclyne.  Pirate attacks have returned to the Gulf of Aden, disturbing Somali waters once a hotbed for piracy but which in recent years achieved a remarkable reversal. At least six commercial vessels have been hijacked or attacked in northern Somali waters since March. U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis warned of the new threat during a press conference last week in neighboring Djibouti, where the United States maintains its only semi-permanent military base on the continent. With relatively minor exceptions, the attacks are the region’s first in five years, a lull reached by a combination of international and private security efforts. But that lull eventually became a victim of its own success, with prevention fatiguing after attacks abated. Governments rolled back robust defense operations, eventually relegating them to monitoring and surveillance. Shipping companies followed suit, cutting costs on expensive security guards once hired to arm and defend their vessels. Secretary Mattis’s warning, however, wasn’t aimed at the navies or military policy which once protected Gulf of Aden shipping lanes. Instead, his remarks were in reference to private shipping companies who should pick up the tab, strengthen security, and reconsider arming their vessels. “We want to make sure the industry continues not to be lax,” said General Thomas Waldhauser (head of U.S. Africa Command), as he re-enforced Secretary Mattis’s position. Yet the drivers of piracy are decidedly international. General Waldhauser attributed the re-emergent attacks to the drought parching the Horn of Africa and famine looming over Somalia, just as the war-ravaged nation enters its “lean season.” Before famine, the modus operandi of Somali pirates had been hijackings-for-ransom, with crewmembers held hostage for months – even years – as their captors negotiated lucrative ransoms. However, without the luxury of time, some recent attacks have skipped drawn-out negotiations to loot cargo in a sign of Somalia’s desperation and resource crunch. This is all despite gradual gains in Somali governance and development, with historic February elections inaugurating a new federal government and attracting foreign capital. However, extremist group al-Shabaab still controls most of Somalia’s vast hinterland where it stands to exploit the famine and drive more unemployed youth toward the sea. President Trump has refocused on Somalia, expanding U.S. military authority to strike al-Shabaab, but traditional counterterrorism operations will do little to prevent piracy, whose networks remain generally distinct from al-Shabaab’s, and may even exacerbate the famine and violence piracy thrives in. Another international driver behind Somalia’s piracy is the overfishing and depletion of Somali waters. Last week’s New York Times exposé of China’s outsized impact on seafood resources focused on West Africa, where China's deep-sea vessels now catch most of their fish. But that’s because a global free-for-all already depleted Somalia’s waters, where corrupt governments continue selling off what’s left. Somalis arrested for piracy often say they are actually fishermen forced to enter shipping lanes from depleted coastal waters. That is rarely true – fishing doesn’t require the AK-47s suspects are caught with – but their excuses do reveal the international dilemma at the heart of piracy. General Waldhauser indicated that he is not ready to conclude that Somali piracy is trending back. But with famine and drought exacerbating its drivers amid a vacuum of deterrence, solutions could be as complex as the problem, requiring a return to international and private measures.

Peter Lundberg, United Nations (UN) Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for Nigeria, stated on April 25 that the aid organizations working in northeast Nigeria will run out of cash by June if pledges made by the international donors at a February  conference in Oslo are not paid. The UN Office for the Coordinaton for Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates that 4.7 million people in Nigeria are in need of food for survival, many of whom are victims of Boko Haram. It also projects that some seven million people are in need of multiple forms of humanitarian assistance. The UN estimates that 43,800 are already experiencing famine. Currently the World Food Programme (WFP) is providing rations to 1.3 million people a month, according to Lundberg. Separate from Lundberg’s comments, the WFP said that its funds would run out within weeks, according to Reuters. At Oslo, international donors pledged $457 million toward the $1.5 billion the UN estimates it needs to address the humanitarian disaster in the Lake Chad Basin. However, Lundgren reports that in Nigeria aid agencies have received only 19 percent of the money asked for, in Cameroon agencies have received 23 percent, in Chad 4 percent, and in Niger 47 percent. Due to the size of its population, Nigeria has by far the greatest number of people facing potential starvation. During the conference, donors pledged only about a third of the money the UN estimates is required to meet the Lake Chad humanitarian disaster, while the United States pledged no new money at all. With respect to pledges, slow payment is an old song, often reflecting national bureaucratic and other requirements. The UN number of 4.7 million in Nigeria needing rations to survive is higher than the more frequently cited estimate of 2.5 million (a figure in reference to those internally displaced by Boko Haram). However, given the destruction of northeast Nigeria, and the depths of its poverty even in the best of times, such statistics seem credible. The UN notes that it is unable to reach some 700,000 because of ongoing Boko Haram activities. It remains to be seen when or if the American public will be galvanized by the famine, and whether it will demand greater proactivity from its federal government with regards to the crises.