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It is NOT the free market. It is a corrupt leadership selling out their own people having been bribed to do so.
What are the farmers supposed to do? Why couldn't an arrangement have been made to allow the foreign investors to provide technical assistance, financing, equipment and markets so that these people could upgrade their skills.
This is in part why so many Africans are now fleeing across the Mediterranean to become beggars on the streets of Rome, Madrid or Paris.
That is not how capitalists do and I can't think of any country on Earth that has developed its agricultural industry in such a fashion.
The reason why African slavery in the Americas existed was all due to agriculture. The life expectancy of an African slave in the Caribbean was 6 or 7 years. Farming families in later periods typically had 10 or more children to do work on the farm. As late as my grandmother’s generation, she had 11 kids.
Small scale farming just isn’t appealing these days, no matter how much some of you glamorize it,
Small scale farming was never really viable beyond a subsistence level. I mean the the history of Haiti is a great example of this phenomenon. It was once a jewel of the French colonies where large plantations with brutalized slaves as labor yielded great quantities of sugar, coffee and other agricultural products exported to Europe and North America. Then the revolution came and the great plantations were broken up. Holdings became smaller during each successive generation to the point that today dozens of family members farm meager plots that can barely feed themselves forget selling it domestically or exporting.
I suggest that when you look and see farming in Europe and also the farmers who sell at local markets in places like NYC. Not huge acreages.
Do you think that the massive acreages in some parts of the USA where slave labor is used, the defecate in the fields, and then a vegetable has to be recalled because of contamination, is sustainable? What of the excessive irrigation used in the deserts of the southwest where water is now running out?
In fact modern farming uses drip irrigation methods, hydroponics, and all this can only be done where there is careful supervision. Water is fast becoming a scarce commodity as the folks out West will soon find out when their pipes run dry, or farmers are forced to wage violent wars against city dwellers.
More of a niche market in a very wealthy developed market. These aren't farms designed to feed the masses or to export abroad. The farms in the developing world either need to feed the natives, thereby reducing the need to import. Or to export abroad to get hard currency. Small organic farms can't do that.
People need to understand Africa is responsible for about 2% of global trade. It is woefully behind and is at the mercy of entrenched superpowers in North America but more consequentially in Europe and Asia. It is going to be very difficult for most African countries to get a foothold in the global economy. There are some success stories. Kenya really is becoming a major player in the flower market for example but the story in the rest of the continent is pretty bad and getting worse.
African countries that aren't focused on agriculture and food production are going to be in a bad shape in the decades to come.
People need to understand Africa is responsible for about 2% of global trade. It is woefully behind and is at the mercy of entrenched superpowers in North America but more consequentially in Europe and Asia. It is going to be very difficult for most African countries to get a foothold in the global economy. There are some success stories. Kenya really is becoming a major player in the flower market for example but the story in the rest of the continent is pretty bad and getting worse.
African countries that aren't focused on agriculture and food production are going to be in a bad shape in the decades to come.
Ghana has the world’s fastest growing economy according to both the IMF and World Bank. Ethiopia is number 2.
Oh yes they do in certain fields. Real estate, advertising, etc. Portugal makes a lot of money in tourism. So anything relating to tourism, that includes banking, advertising, real estate, among others will indeed hire Northern Europeans who can sell to Northern Europeans and Americans. The same is true of Spain and Italy. All three Southern European nations encourage tourism and foreign investment. Of course that attracts immigrants from around the world.
Of course you have retirees from Northern Europe moving in as well.
Total nonsense. Northern People and Americans who come here speak English, and the Portuguese also speak English.
"who can sell to" makes no sense as there is much more demand than supply. The Portuguese don't have to offer their stuff to foreigners at all, it is ripped out of their hands. And of course the Portuguese know the local market inside out, unlike foreigners who have no clue of the country, culture etc. So no, there is no need for Northern or US immigrants in banking, advertising, real estate etc. at all.
The golden visa program intended to attract foreign investors is mainly used by Chinese and Brazilian immigrants.
Ghana has the world’s fastest growing economy according to both the IMF and World Bank. Ethiopia is number 2.
Ghana's economy depends a lot on oil and gas exports. Hence it is vulnerable just like Angola's.
Ethiopia is a different story, though. Much more solid. But there are internal conflicts with certain ethnic groups, which can easily lead to yet another African civil war.
People need to understand Africa is responsible for about 2% of global trade. It is woefully behind and is at the mercy of entrenched superpowers in North America but more consequentially in Europe and Asia. It is going to be very difficult for most African countries to get a foothold in the global economy. There are some success stories. Kenya really is becoming a major player in the flower market for example but the story in the rest of the continent is pretty bad and getting worse.
African countries that aren't focused on agriculture and food production are going to be in a bad shape in the decades to come.
That is also my impression.
The flower boom in Kenya is also problematic. There was a documentary on that the other day.
In the long run, Africa needs to catch up in terms of technology and science. Unfortunately that is also where they lag behind the most. And as long as that has not changed (a change also slowed down or even prevented by the patent mania in the West; developing countries should ignore such laws and illegally copy stuff initially, else there is no catching up anymore), agriculture can be a major pillar of both the economy and society.
I don't agree at all that small-scale farming has no future and that we need industrial farming with all the problems it causes. Interesting read: https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/colin-..._11671490.html
That is not how capitalists do and I can't think of any country on Earth that has developed its agricultural industry in such a fashion.
Enlightened capitalists sometimes do think that way. There is no charity here. Who do you think that small and mid sized farmers in much of the world sell to.
But I guess you think that they should toss people off lands and then be forced to abandon their investments when some of these people become terrorists and attack them. Boko Haram emerged from issues which Nigerian elites chose to ignore and now we see the results. Niger is a very vulnerable place and Islamists are already active there, so why assist in their attempts to recruit?
Small scale farming was never really viable beyond a subsistence level..
Haiti's demise had nothing to do with the fact that they are small scale farmers. In fact in much of the rest of the Caribbean many of these types of farmers are doing perfectly well. Haiti used to export sugar from plantations, but no longer do so either. And I am talking about up to not that long ago. In fact in much of the Caribbean its the large scale agriculture which is no longer competitive.
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