A hopeful future

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Sadly, this will be my last post. Here I reflect on my blogging journey and acknowledge other issues of water management I did not manage to discuss.

Despite the various situated and growing challenges, from the outset I wanted to use my blog to showcase the ways smallholder farmers across Africa are mitigating against the hegemonic influence of conventional agriculture, climate change, the lack of irrigation infrastructure, and soil degradation. I have highlighted a range of solutions, from techno-scientific responses such as GMOs, desalination and LNC, alternative agricultural practices such as Agroforestry to more creative ideas such as finding value in sanitation and agricultural waste. Through these themes, I have featured place-based examples from all across Africa – drawing from Egypt, Kenya, Niger, Madagascar, Somaliland and Zambia to illustrate that the successful potential of these responses. Moreover, I have tried to keep my blog in sync with ongoing events during the time of writing such as the UK government's decision to cut aid in November and the iSDA soil map which came out in December.

To conclude, Africa is a hugely diverse continent, there are many different spaces with varying geographical conditions which means that each farmer faces their own set of challenges and must respond to them accordingly. The solutions I have highlighted are by no means the ‘only’ solutions available nor are they applicable for all farmers across Africa and therefore, they must not be implemented in a prescriptive manner without considering the local cultural and environmental circumstances.

It is also important to acknowledge the inter-connectedness of water resources across Africa with 93% of total surface resources being located across transboundary river basins (UNEP, 2010). The future management of water resources in Africa at multi-national scales will be key to ensure the fair access of water for populations at upstream and downstream ends of basins. Moreover, cooperation and communication between different sectors and actors will be key. Water usage beyond agriculture including sanitation, industry and domestic will concurrently increase overtime and so a movement towards integrated water resources management is perhaps most favourable (AMCOW, 2018).

I believe the case-studies I have drawn on demonstrate there is a hopeful future for African agriculture. With existing scientific (and indigenous) knowledge, African agriculture can avoid the mistakes and environmental damage of conventional agriculture, while sustainably utilising and managing water resources. Through my blog journey I have expanded my knowledge on a continent I knew little about and have many more ideas which I would love to share but sadly I must end here. At a personal level, this blog was a joy to write and a space of hopeful and generous thinking during current uncertain times. I do hope you have enjoyed reading it too!

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