2050 Outlook: Strong pressure on land in Africa

The French National Institute for Agricultural, Food and Environmental Research (INRAe) has just published a study, commissioned by the Pluriagri association, which offers an overview of different possible futures for global agriculture by 2050. The projections include, in detail, the foreseeable impact of climate change on agricultural productivity.[1].

The study explores several scenarios, based on two sets of simulations, relating respectively to crop yields and population diets. "High" yields are made possible by a sustained pace of technical developments and the full exploitation of the fertilizing effect of CO2 by plants. "Low" yields result from more moderate technical developments and a lack of exploitation of the CO2 effect by plants. So-called "trend" diets correspond to the extension of past regional trends; they result in the stabilization of individual calorie intake in developed countries and their increase in emerging and developing regions. Finally, "healthy" diets illustrate a radical and widespread transition in diet, following the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO): the consumption of animal products would decrease in Europe and other developed regions, while it would increase in Africa and Asia.

Given the population expansion, the study projects, between 2010 (average of the years 2009 to 2011) and 2050, an increase in global food consumption, expressed in calories, of 47 % under the assumption of trend diets. This increase would be reduced to 38 % in the event of a shift towards healthy diets.

The case of sub-Saharan Africa is particularly edifying.[2]The increase in consumption in the sub-region would represent nearly 30 % of the increase in global demand under trend diets and up to 50 % under healthy diets. Regardless of the type of diet, in fact, the population explosion would induce a near tripling of food consumption in countries south of the Sahara.[3].

Net imports (imports minus exports) would increase by a factor of 3.5 to 3.7, depending on the scenarios[4]In 2050, they would provide approximately 17 % of the calories consumed in the sub-region.

Agricultural production in sub-Saharan Africa would grow slightly less quickly, by a factor of 2.6 to 2.9. The question is what combination of cultivated areas and yields would make it possible to achieve this increase in production.

If yields were to increase slightly – on average, according to our estimates, by 30 to 40 %, in calories per hectare, compared to 2010 – it would be necessary to cultivate 196 to 264 million additional hectares in the sub-region, depending on the diets[5]If the growth in yields were more marked – i.e. + 90 to + 100 % by 2050 – the need for additional areas would be lower, between 75 and 122 million hectares, but would nevertheless require a substantial extension, from a third to a half, of the areas cultivated in 2010 (table).

According to INRAe, this sharp increase in cultivated land could occur "to the detriment of natural environments and/or currently wooded areas" and "induce an increase in greenhouse gas emissions and/or harm biodiversity." In fact, in a report recently published by WillAgri, Pierre Jacquemot estimates that there are approximately 100 million hectares of unexploited land in sub-Saharan Africa, theoretically available for agriculture, after deducting forests and protected areas.[6]. Taking into account the degradation of soils, caused in particular by inadequate agricultural practices, "the actual availability still unexploited, and likely to be exploited in environmentally sustainable conditions (...) and with yields above an acceptable minimum, (...) would be approximately of the order of 50 million hectares." This figure could still be overestimated, because "the previous data include a jumble of fallow land, (...) but also land used by populations for their survival (gathering, firewood harvesting, hunting), community forests or even areas reserved for ancestral rites which must obviously be excluded under penalty of putting the general ecosystem of the territories concerned in a critical situation."

The INRAE prospective study thus highlights the scale of the challenge facing African governments: creating the conditions conducive to a considerable increase in agricultural productivity, in a manner that is ecologically and socially acceptable to the population.

[1] INRAe, “Place of European agriculture in the world by 2050. Between climate issues and challenges of global food security”, February 2019. Documents available on https://www.inrae.fr/actualites/agricultures-europeennes-horizon-2050#anchor1_4

[2] The study distinguishes between West Africa, on the one hand, and East, Central, and Southern Africa, on the other. Here we present the results for the whole of sub-Saharan Africa, calculated by FARM based on data published by INRAe.

[3] It should be noted that the adoption of WHO-recommended diets in sub-Saharan Africa would lead to an increase in demand for 8 % in 2050 compared to trend diets, due to greater needs for animal products.

[4] The GlobAgri-AE2050 model, used by INRAe for simulations, is based on the assumption that for each agricultural production, in each country, the share of consumption that is imported and the share of production in global exports would remain constant between 2010 and 2050. These shares are adjusted by the model if the anticipated increase in agricultural production, in a given region, comes up against a lack of arable land.

[5] The percentage yield increases presented here are for guidance only. They correspond to the increase in total agricultural production, expressed in calories, divided by the cultivated area, taking into account crop intensity, i.e. the number of harvests carried out each year on the same plots. The crop yield growth assumptions considered in the study vary significantly by crop and by country.

[6] Pierre Jacquemot, “Agricultural land available in sub-Saharan Africa?”, WillAgri, January 3, 2020. File available on https://www.willagri.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Dossier-Willagri-01-20-FR.pdf