GEO-6 Regional Assessment for Africa
Box 3.2.4: Helping Hands in East Africa
From 2015, governments and particularly, the private sector in Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and United Republic of Tanzania are pushing for regional development. In addition, big companies from China, India and the Arab Gulf States are making large investments in the region. Their focus, however, is on industry, services, tourism and, especially, export agriculture. As a consequence, food security, environments and livelihoods are low on the agenda. A region-wide one-sided emphasis on economic growth makes East African countries vulnerable to global market forces and environmental degradation. But continuing regional integration leads to a better functioning East African Community, and in 2028, a single East African currency is introduced, making the region more economically independent and bringing greater stability.
Agriculture is mostly focused on cash crops such as coffee, tea, cotton and tobacco, mainly for export. Food security is not highlighted in policies; therefore, food crop production for regional consumption is on the decline. However, because of a higher GDP, the living standards of the middle-income class have improved, and imported food meets their demands. Increasingly, the region’s neglect of environmental issues is compromising its competitiveness on the global market, affecting its exports. Consequently, international companies are starting to leave East Africa throughout the 2020s. In addition, a period of severe drought strikes the sub-region in the early 2020s, leading to even more food insecurity among rural communities. International food aid from Europe and Asia minimizes famine in most parts of the sub- region, at least in the short-term. In South Sudan and Somalia, however, continuous drought leads to mass starvation. In other parts, new health issues start to emerge due to changing food consumption practices, and a sharp increase is observed in non-communicable diseases such as obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular complaints.
The severe drop in agricultural productivity causes massive waves of migration towards the cities. These new, poor city dwellers experience inadequate housing and a lack of clean water and sanitation, leading to a lower quality of life. As a consequence of the one-sided focus on economic growth through export, the sub-region is unable to react adequately to the massive drought that hits the land during the early 2020s. Export demands are no longer met, leading to a bending of the rules by East African governments to attract new external investment. This, in turn, triggers further decline in both ethical and environmental standards.
Environmental degradation starts to show from 2020 onwards. The region’s Great Lakes, once part of a key characteristic physical landscape, are shrinking steadily. Africa’s largest lake in terms of surface area, Lake Victoria, sees a drop in water level of approximately 2.5 metres, while Kenya’s Lake Nakuru is suffering a fate similar to the Aral Sea in the former Soviet Union: during the dry season, the lake’s surface area is regularly less than half of its size back in 2015. In addition, the overcrowded cities and more intensive forms of agriculture and industry exert increased pressure on these aquatic ecosystems in the form of pollution. This leads to eutrophication, causing fish stocks to decline and invasive algae and weeds to bloom.
From 2030 onwards, as foreign companies have largely left East Africa, joint efforts to counter environmental degradation and related food insecurity are proving successful in some parts of the region, including the areas surrounding Kampala,
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