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... ave evolved in response to local agro-ecological and socioeconomic condition. However, intensification with these technologies alone is unlikely to be sufficient in most Sub-Saharan African countries to achieve agricultural growth rates of 4 percent per year and more. Improved variety / fertilization /farm mechanization technologies will also be necessary. Increased use of fertilizers will be especially important to raise yields and maintain soil fertility. Intensive and resource-conserving agriculture must be made less risky and more profitable.
This requires appropriate marketing, price, tax and exchange rate policies as well as investments in rural infrastructure, health and education facilities. Creating parks, reserves and community-owned range land and protecting these against conversion into crop land will be important to conserve natural resources and bio diversity. So will reducing infrastructure development in forests and other fragile areas to discourage settlement in these areas. Since this will limit the scope for further expansion of cropped land and, potentially, the scope for agricultural production growth, there is a trade-off between conservation and agricultural growth. Creating additional protection areas will only be feasible and sustainable if agricultural production can be intensified at the rate suggested here (i.
e. to about a 3. 5 percent annual increase in farm out put per unit of land farmed). in this sense, conservation and agricultural intensification are complementary. As African farmers have shown, land scarcity leads to agricultural intensification -- if the necessary advice and inputs are available, intensification can be made sustainable and the rate of intensification greatly accelerated. Infrastructure Development and Settlement Policy The strong bias in urban infrastructure investments favoring the few major cities needs to be abandoned.
Adequate transport lines to product markets are major factors associated with the intensification of farming -- even where population densities are comparatively low. Rural roads and improved tracks navigable for animal-drawn vehicles are crucial. Major efforts are also needed to promote the use of locally suitable and appropriate intermediate transport technology, especially animal-drawn implements, and of improved off-road transport. Infrastructure development also has a major impact on the productivity of rural labour and on key determinants of fertility. Roads provide access to health facilities and schools. Better educated and healthier farmers are more productive and more likely to be innovators.
Water supply and sanitation facilities have significant impact on health and labour productivity. Rural water supply, sanitation, health and education facilities and services are particularly important in terms of their impact on infant and child mortality and on female education -- both critical determinants of fertility preferences. With the major exceptions of the humid regions of Central and coastal West Africa, almost all of Sub-Saharan Africa will be facing water shortages or water scarcity early in the next century. There is an urgent need for effective hydrological planning and for prudent demand management.
Water must be recognized as the critical and limiting resource it is. it must be carefully allocated, and must be protected against pollution. Planning for water use must be based on natural hydrological units such as river basins and integrated with planning for land use and other activities that affect, and are affected by, water development. Since water resources are frequently shared among countries, it is important to cooperate closely in planning for long-term water sharing. Twenty-one of the world's thirty poorest countries are in sub-Saharan Africa. Nearly half the region's people live in absolute poverty - the equivalent of a dollar a day or less.
Positive per capita growth in the past four years has not been enough to prevent an increase in the absolute number living in poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. By end of 1998, nearly 23 million adults and children were estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa - accounting for 2 / 3 of the world's infected persons. More than 1. 8 million Africans will die from AIDS this year. New infection rates are staggering: in South Africa, 1, 750 are infected by AIDS daily. Problems extend beyond the health sector.
HIV/AIDS has raised the cost of doing business, killing professionals, schoolteachers and farmers, reducing incomes now and investments in the future. HIV/AIDS is overloading social welfare systems. Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 95 % of the 13 million children worldwide who will be orphaned by AIDS by end of 2000. At current rates of population growth, sub-Saharan Africa will grow to over one billion people by 2020, despite declining birthrates and increasing number of deaths from AIDS. Contraceptive prevalence rates have been rising for the last three decades, yet remain under 10 % in most of sub-Saharan Africa.
The high rate of population growth intensifies existing social, political, economic, and environmental pressures. Aids assists African countries to reduce these pressures through family planning programs emphasizing healthier, smaller families, and through support of girls education, a major determinant of family size. As a result of the above information you can see that rapid population growth in Sub-Saharan Africa at the present time is a moment of opportunity on the African continent. Africa is making new headway: democracy and economic reform are revitalizing the continent, and a number of countries are experiencing dynamic economic growth.
With greater political open-ness, African governments are increasingly seeking to address the health and education needs of their people. Despite these positive trends, sub-Saharan Africa faces a development challenge greater than any other region. Africa's progress has not reached enough people, and too much of the continent is still plagued by political instability. Many African nations are struggling to meet the health and education needs of populations expanding at about three percent a year. In too many countries, rapid population growth continues to threaten the natural resource base and future prospects for prosperity. The region's ability to slow current high rates of population growth is thus key to achieving its full potential for development.
The international community has good reason to care about African development. The continent is endowed with ample mineral and agricultural resources, including the greatest potential in the world for increases in farm productivity. Africa is also one of the last untapped markets for goods and services; industrialized countries thus stand to benefit by trading with a more prosperous Africa. Beyond economic self-interest, there are strong humanitarian reasons to support efforts to alleviate poverty in Africa, home to 11 percent of the world's population. In many respects, Africa in the late 1990 s resembles the East Asian economies as they began their economic take-off three decades ago.
African governments need to emphasize three key strategies in their efforts to improve individual well-being and slow population growth. The first priority should be to expand reproductive health and family planning services to meet existing unmet needs. The second, to expand educational and economic opportunities, especially for women, both to improve the lives of individuals and to help encourage a desire for smaller families. The third, to slow the momentum of future population growth through education and reproductive health programs that help young people choose to delay childbearing.
Carrying out the comprehensive agenda described above will require enormous effort by African governments. The task is large, yet attainable if these governments increase their current low levels of commitment to reproductive health and family planning programs. Governments and donors should be prepared to invest years of sustained effort to build successful population programs. Over the long haul, there are bound to be setbacks and difficulties. Currently, there is no reason to expect that either the fertility or development transitions will occur more quickly and with less external aid in sub-Saharan Africa than they did in other places. Yet the needs are pressing, and Africa must accelerate the development of population programs and the current trend towards smaller families.
This may be possible if African countries are willing to learn as much as possible from the experiences of other regions, while at the same time recognizing the continent's own special challenges, such as the HIV/AIDS crisis. Africa's relatively recent establishment of population policies and programs has given it the chance to learn from both the mistakes and achievements of other regions which have grappled with the problem of rapid population growth. African countries, with help from the world community, have the potential to build on these experiences and create their own success story. Bibliography: Bibliography Aryeetey-Auto, Samuel, Geography of Sub-Saharan Africa, Prentice Hall, New Jersey, 1997 Berg, Elliot Accelerated Development in Sub-Saharan Africa, International Bank, Washington, 1991 James E. Rosen, Shanti R. Could, Africa's Population Challenge: Accelerating Progress in Reproductive Health, Population Action International, Washington, 1998 Palmer, Ingrid, Gender and population in the adjustment of African economies: Planning for change, International Labour Office, Geneva, 1991 STUDY SERIES # 4 Thomas.
M. F. Environment and Land Use in Africa, Methuen & Co Ltd. London, 1990 web web
Free research essays on topics related to: agricultural production, rapid population growth, saharan africa, hiv aids, african countries
Research essay sample on Rapid Population Growth Saharan Africa
