Blog – Friday August 05, 2022
Addressing post-harvest losses in African countries:
Perspectives and solutions
Author: Balaji Vasudevan
Introduction
Today, one of the major global initiatives of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is to provide food security for the growing world population while ensuring long-term sustainable development. According to the latest FAO projections, food production will need to increase by 70% to feed a world population of 9 billion by 2050 [1]. This pledge legitimizes the huge amount of renewed international attention around reducing the post-harvest loss and waste incurred in the global food system.
Despite the large number of investigative papers written on the recurring post- harvest food losses, I believe that much remains to be done for countries in Africa. Over the last several years, there has been no shortage of discussion on the food loss challenges that African farmers are facing. Despite the efforts that have been implemented, these challenges still exist. However, there is hope from new post-harvest loss technologies and practical working approaches that could make a huge impact on Africa’s bright prospects if food security were to be achieved.
Challenges
Global food production, security and sustainability are facing enormous challenges. There is an immediate and urgent need to fundamentally change the food system to feed the fast-growing African population, while ending hunger and tackling unhealthy diets. This change requires a coordinated and large-scale effort from stakeholders across multiple sectors.
As of 2020, 282 million Africans [2] went hungry because of insecurity, inadequate agricultural infrastructure, and drought. In addition to public sector initiatives, startups have been built to solve some of the sector’s problems.
Food wastage is a major global problem that needs immediate attention and more investments to fund and develop technological solutions aimed at food waste elimination and management. FAO estimates that over 40% of fresh produce goes to waste and the global costs of food waste [3] and post-harvest loss (PHL) amount to about $2.6 trillion per year, including $700 billions of environmental costs and $900 billions of social costs [4].
Opportunities
In the last decade, the topic of food loss and waste has acquired global attention. The impact of food loss on food security, nutrition, and economic stability is even more pronounced. About $1 trillion of food is lost or wasted every year, accounting for roughly 1/3rd of the world’s food, reversing the trend would preserve enough food to feed 2 billion people [5].
According to a research project that was conducted by Drawdown [6], the results showed that:
- If food waste were reduced by 50% by 2050, along with the adoption of a plant-rich diet, we could avoid emissions equal to 26.2 billion tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs).
- Reducing food waste also avoids deforestation for additional farmland. This could prevent 44.4 billion tons of additional emissions.
- Reducing food loss and waste can also help close the over 60% gap between food available today and food needed in 2050. This would go far in helping to eliminate world hunger.
Reducing PHL of food crops is a critical component of sustainably increasing agricultural productivity. Many PHL reduction interventions have been tested, but synthesized information to support evidence-based investments and policy is scarce. Sustainable PHL reduction can be achieved through collaboration with stakeholders across the agricultural value chain by implementing market driven solutions. Given its substantial scale, reducing PHL will help create more sustainable and resilient food systems, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. PHL reduction can simultaneously optimize agricultural productivity and increase the incomes of small-scale food producers and associated value-chain actors, especially women, who are traditionally responsible for many postharvest activities.
I have been working with UM6P Ventures for the last several months. As the venture capital arm of UM6P University backed by OCP group in Morocco, they are deeply interested in addressing food waste and PHL problems in Africa by enhancing the farm to fork process, improving income for smallholder farmers, and increasing net food production.
Managing PHL in Africa
Several approaches and technologies, both traditional and more advanced, could be deployed to address PHL food loss. Each has its pros and cons depending on the type of grain and the supply-chain conditions. The long-term adoption of these technologies in emerging markets may depend on a range of external social, economic, and institutional factors. Although there are many angles from which to address post-harvest losses, storage technology interventions attributable to temperature and humidity may be one of the key areas to tackle to reduce overall waste, particularly in grains.
Many technologies and innovations have been developed to address the various causes of food losses. However, some of these have either not reached the targeted user or have not had the desired result. This is partially due to lack of awareness and cost. Some technologies are also unsuitable for the African market. The lack of studies on training, finance, infrastructure, policy, and market interventions highlights the need for interventions beyond technology or changes to best practices. Creating awareness about the applicable technologies and demonstrating their benefits is one way to yield results. There is no shortage of technologies to reduce or even eliminates post-harvest losses, but what is needed is broader access to them.
One potential solution would be to facilitate the introduction and production of cheaper technologies that address PHL across the African continent. African experts have also emphasized the need for national governments and regional organizations to adopt efficient policies and technology-driven interventions to reduce post-harvest losses that stifle food security in the region.
Potential Working Approaches and Solutions to Address PHL
African experts have expressed the need for national governments and regional bodies to adopt effective policies and technology-driven interventions to reduce post-harvest losses that are stifling food security in the region. Investments are required in post-harvest management (PHM) to transform the food systems in alignment with the challenges of smallholder farmers in Africa. Scaling the traditional and modern post-harvest management techniques are needed to develop seed varieties to curtail post-harvest diseases, enhance resistance to bruising and slow down ripening. In addition, there is an urgent need for the participation of the private sector to increase funding that will help address the PHL problem.
Shared experiences from private and public sectors reveal that managing post-harvest losses and improving food and nutritional security issues can only be solved by:
- Identifying constraints and bottlenecks in the sector
- Implementing concrete measures and actions to address the problems linked to post-harvest losses management
- Strengthening partnerships and supporting small-scale producers and smallholder farmers
- Establishing strong international institutional partnerships and public-private partnerships to share best practices with all stakeholders
- Implementing smallholder farmer literacy program initiatives to help them learn, educate, acquire, and implement new technologies and best practices.
Solutions built upon partnerships spanning farmer engagement, research input, access to technological innovations, private sector buy-in, and government-level policy support should be implemented, adopted, and practiced to address and manage the PHL problem.
I firmly believe that increasing investments in post-harvest loss technologies is long overdue. It could have a major impact on reducing food loss and increasing the food supply. This will lead to improved incomes without increasing production and wasting expenditures on all the needed components such as land, water, seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, and labor. Maintaining quality, especially taste and nutritional value, and ensuring food safety (avoiding chemical and microbial contamination) should be the focus of future investments and activities in all countries over the long term.
[1] https://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/wsfs/docs/Issues_papers/HLEF2050_Global_Agriculture.pdf
[2] https://www.worldvision.org/hunger-news-stories/africa-hunger-famine-facts
[3] https://www.fao.org/in-action/seeking-end-to-loss-and-waste-of-food-along-production-chain/en/
[4] https://www.fao.org/nr/sustainability/food-loss-and-waste/en/
[5] https://www.wfpusa.org/articles/8-facts-to-know-about-food-waste-and-hunger/
[6] https://www.rbcgam.com/en/ca/article/food-loss-waste/detail