One key obstacle to food production in West Africa is insufficient access to fertiliser. Organisations have been working towards ensuring fertiliser prices are within the reach of farmers. DANIEL ESSIET reports
THE Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), World Bank, and UN World Food Programme (WFP) have forecast severe food shortages due to shocks on food systems.
To address these, several multi-stakeholder dialogues have been convened to facilitate the sharing of good practices, innovations, and advocate actions to ensure smallholder farmers have access to fertiliser to safeguard their food and nutrition security.
Some of these meetings have reflected on regional efforts towards the production of fertiliser in Africa, educating farmers on the correct use, improving access to soil-testing facilities to guide the targeted application, promoting agronomic practices, deployment of smart and targeted subsidies programmes, use of e-voucher systems for distribution, incentives to promote the local production such as tax incentives for raw materials import and access to capital by the private sector for setting up fertiliser blending plants.
Above all, there was a call for an urgent action to make fertiliser affordable and accessible to farmers given the prohibitive prices and transportation costs and develop area specific soil fertility maps. Africa utilises an average 12 kg of fertiliser per hectare, according to the International Fertiliser Industry Association (IFA).
Also, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) noted that fertiliser use in Nigeria Kenya, and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa was still below 50kg per hectare, compared to Asian countries such as Malaysia where consumption averages 1,570kg per hectare, Hong Kong 1,297kg per hectare and Bangladesh at 278 kg per hectare.
Consequently, IFPRI has thrown its weight behind meetings across Africa held to discuss how to address issues impacting growth of fertiliser use, including poor-quality control, weak agro-dealer networks, lack of initiatives to provide financial services to importers and agro-dealers, poor port, rail and road infrastructure and unsustainable, poorly planned and coordinated subsidy programmes.
One of such meetings was the Afriqom Fertiliser Club meeting held in Accra, Ghana. It was their first, held in partnership with International Fertiliser Development Centre (IFDC), West African Fertiliser Association (WAFA) and others. Afriqom, a consulting firm, is the provider of market information on the African fertiliser market.
The conference gathered experts who spoke on the ideal market conditions and the state of change in industry, among others.
Speakers described West Africa as a major market, with producers and manufacturers building on their dominant positions in producing nitrogen and phosphate based fertilisers.They discussed broadening intra-Africa trade, increasing fertiliser consumption across the sub region, and, ultimately, boosting agricultural productivity. However, the consensus was that there are opportunities on the horizon.
One of the speakers was the Senior Vice President, OCP Africa, Mr. Mohamed Hettiti, a supporter of made-in-Africa fertiliser.
He saw how vulnerable food supply chain was during the COVID-19 pandemic and has been on the campaign for the sector to address the problem, including the production of specialty fertiliser to help agricultural producers.
By expanding the production of domestic fertiliser supplies, his organisation has been able to grow independent local businesses, bring production and jobs to rural communities in Nigeria.
He noted that the AFRIQOM Fertiliser Club has become pivotal in the fertiliser space within Africa and beyond.
Hettiti’s words: “We’re happy to see African organisations and institutions commit to spread access to information and data towards the growth of the agriculture value chain in Africa.
“Africa cannot be satisfied with imported models and must lead the way in achieving its green agricultural revolution by setting an example for sustainable nutrition through customisations of our own solutions. We have invested in research and development in partnership with agronomic research institutions to implement initiatives centered on farmers and to develop fertiliser formulas adapted to their soil and crops. We have mapped over 50 Mha of land across African countries, strengthen capacity of laboratories, and developed specific programs to meet our partner’s needs.
“Over 44 formulas have been customised to local conditions and crop needs, and we have worked with partners to connect farmers to the agricultural services, knowledge, and resources they need to prosper.”
Hettiti reiterated that their company’s partnerships with organisations to grow agriculture in Africa has led to the creation of platforms that allow dialogues and synergies to address the challenges faced by farmers, including infrastructure, knowledge, market access, and financing.
He said: “An example is our partnership with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), through its West Africa Trade & Investment Hub, to establish a fertiliser-blending plant facility in Nigeria to bridge the lack of specialised fertiliser to grow crops on a large scale and support food security in the country.
“The partnership targets rural smallholder farmers who will have access to high-yielding customised fertiliser that promises to grow their productivity by as much as 85 per cent and create jobs for many young men and women in Nigeria.”
Hettiti called on international partners to address food security and agricultural challenges on the continent.
Fertiliser prices doubled between 2021 and last year due to price hikes caused by the war in Ukraine, a limited supply of the minerals, high energy costs, high global demand and agricultural commodity prices and reliance on imports.
Indeed, Afriqom has been part of an effort to help producers boost production and address Africa’s food insecurity.
In light of the challenges, Chief Executive Officer, Afriqom, United Kingdom, Mounir Halim indicated that the key stakeholders in fertiliser industry were trying to strike a balance between enhancing agricultural productivity and staying ahead of turbulent conditions that affects the industry.
Halim noted that the fertiliser market has evolved, but urged for more discussions to address the major constraints to Africa’s agricultural productivity growth.
He said Africa was on the way to becoming one of the world’s leading producers of fertiliser, and steadily developing new capacity.
For him, long-term prospects remain strong, as the demand for food, and thus fertilisers, keep on increasing.
Given the steady growth of the population in the sub-region, Executive Secretary, WAFA, Dr. Innocent Okuku, reiterated that fertiliser role in feeding Africa would be essential for years to come.
He gave an overview of the fertiliser market in West Africa. Despite this great potential, he said, the sub-region was still grappling with logistic problems.
He said the agriculture sector in a large part of Africa has continued to be characterised by low-fertiliser use as well as low-crop yields.
According to him, scaling up fertiliser production is a key step in strengthening regional input and agricultural value chains so that countries in the sub region can become more food-secure.
In line with this, Okuku indicated that a lot of efforts had been made to improve food security and nutrition for millions of people through increased local production of fertiliser.
A key goal of WAFA, he maintained, was to build a reliable market that guarantees sustainable access to quality and affordable fertiliser to farmers in West Africa.
He acknowledged that the sub-region was facing severe challenges in the cost and availability of fertiliser.
He said the collaboration with AFRIQOM was important to the association and its 60 members who account for about 90 per cent of fertiliser supplies in West Africa.
Overall, he said, this collaboration would contribute significantly to helping Africa increase its agricultural production, decrease its dependence on food imports and create wealth among her rural populations.
He reiterated that there was a dire need for stakeholders take long-term views in dealing with fertiliser issues in the larger interest of food security.
WAFA has been involved in improving fertiliser statistics to help policy makers make informed decisions on the industry.
Across the sub-region, governments have been inviting global companies to set up fertiliser manufacturing plants and storage facilities, besides partnering local firms to supply soil nutrients.
Countries within ECOWAS have witnessed an increase in prices of fertiliser and raw materials, despite reforms to ensure the products are made available at affordable prices to farmers.
The prices of fertiliser, seeds and other agricultural inputs have risen to affect continuous production and sustainable security of food.
To improve the availability and affordability of fertiliser, enhance food and agricultural production – as well as security of supply, Afreximbank has been engaging leading fertiliser companies from across West Africa, development finance institutions, technical development partners and public sector representatives. Central to this is the attainment of food security in the region by improving producers’ access to fertiliser.
The bank has identified and onboarded new traders, sellers, and buyers from WAFA members to the African Trade Exchange (ATEX). It has been working with IFDC, the African Fertiliser and Agribusiness Partnership (AFAP), the ECOWAS Commission, OCPAfrica and Presidential Fertiliser Initiative to deploy the ATEX platform to response to the challenge of fertiliser availability.
“ATEX will certainly avail access to essential commodities at affordable prices to African countries that look set to be hit the hardest by the global food price crisis with severe implications on economic and political stability,” Deputy Executive Secretary/Chief Economist, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Ms. Hanan Morsy, said at the presentation of ATEX on the sidelines of the COP27 at Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, which ended recently.
“One of the main implications is that the global fertiliser prices have significantly risen over the last year because of surging input costs, supply disruptions, and export restrictions,” Ms. Morsy said, warning that price spike in fertiliser and shortage would affect the planting season this year unless urgent action was taken to channel the fertiliser where it is needed most in Africa at an affordable price.
Morsy highlighted that ATEX could strengthen Africa’economic resilience as demand would ensure that Africa’s ability to negotiate competitive prices and attenuate the impact of the disruption in the food supply chain.
“There is a dirwe need to reduce the cost of agricultural inputs, especially fertiliser,” Morsy noted, indicating that ATEX offered a huge potential to enhance intra-Africa trade in fertiliser.
Early this year, development partners committed $30 billion to boost food production in Africa over the next five years. The President, African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr Akinwumi Adesina, said the support would enable the countries to increase food production.
The bank also got assurances from Dangote and Indorama and OCP Fertiliser that Africa would not be marginalised in the fertiliser supply chain.
Adesina’s goal is to ensure there is no fertiliser crisis in Africa and that support measures were in place to make fertiliser affordable for farmers.
