By Ephrem Madebo
It is inexplicable
rather disgraceful that on one side western countries paint Africa as the bread
basket of the world, but most western countries and their media talk about dictatorship,
corruption and hunger in Africa [which actually is true]. On the other hand,
western banks and investment companies, university endowments funds, and large
corporations buy large quantity of land from poor African countries and turn it
into a breadbasket of the rich countries of the world. The technology and/or
capital transfer analysis of the development model indicates that large foreign
investment in the agricultural sector of poor countries helps agrarian economies
to transform their agriculture and ultimately lead to economic development.
However, empirical studies of the past few years clearly indicate that foreign
investment companies are profiting from “land grab”, and “land grab” in
developing countries has failed to deliver its promise of jobs, infrastructure,
schools, and health facilities. In fact, the land grabs; due to investors’
recklessness and lack of control from the host countries have led to huge
environmental and social problems in developing countries.
In the last 10
years, a strange phenomenon known as ‘Land Grab’ has ravaged the continent of
Africa that has already been suffering from the failed growth models of the
classical, neo-classical and Marxist schools. In Ethiopia and many other African
countries, the Chinese, the Indians, and the Saudis are buying a huge amount of
farmland to satisfy the food demand of their own population. Ethiopia is one of
the reckless countries that denies ownership of land to its own poor peasants
and sells the nation’s top level fertile land for a knockout price that wows the
buyers themselves.
The last twenty
years history of Ethiopia is full of many dull and eccentric moments, and no
moment of that history is as dull as the TPLF’s silly moment of cheap land sale.
The TPLF calls the cheap land sale a ‘land lease’, but from the point of view of
the grabbers, this new phenomenon is called ‘land grab’, and from the
point of view of poor the Ethiopian farmers, it is called ‘free land give
away’. For over two decades, we Ethiopians have heard how weird Meles
Zenawi and his gangs are. I think their recent economic policies; especially
their land policy has left them naked that now we can see just how weird and
wacky they really are. Ethiopia is a country that suffers the most from hunger
and hunger related problems. Currently, more than 13 million people or about
15.3% its population depends on food aid from rich countries. But, ironically,
the regime in Ethiopia is selling its most fertile land to foreigners whose only
focus is to secure current and future food supply in their own
countries.
Much has been said
about the land grab in Ethiopia, and I believe there is a whole lot left to say.
In Ethiopia land is not just an economic asset; in many parts of Ethiopia land
has spiritual, cultural, ancestral, and sentimental values. Ethiopians, whether
they are pastoralists or settled farmers, their livelihood has an important
cosmic link to their land. Their past and current way of life is rooted in the
land where they were born and have defined their humanity. For example, for the
people of Gambella, their land of origin in the grass lands and forests of the
Gambella area is not only the source of their sustenance; it is also home to
their identity and culture. When one sells or leases this land against the will
of the people, the item being sold is not just land, its culture and
identity.
The land grab in
Ethiopia generally has negative economic and social consequences, and these
consequences differ from place to place within Ethiopia. For example, the land
grab problems in economically forgotten Gambella are very different from other
relatively better-off places. We all know that there was genocide in Gambella
and the current human right abuse in the region is beyond imagination. Now on
top of all these crimes and wicked acts, Zenawi’s regime is selling the most
important cultural and economic asset of the Gambella people. These problems
touch the life of every citizen in Gambella, and may have a far reaching
political consequence if they continue unabated. Here are there areas that I
thought were neglected or not even considered when a decision was made to sell
Gambella’s land.
Eco-system in peril
The Ethiopian region
of Gambella is home to Africa’s second-largest mammal migration, with millions
and millions of animals [some of them endangered species] moving through its
grasslands. The region is one of the most attractive places in Ethiopia with
breathtaking sceneries and remarkable biodiversity. The Gambella National Park
that hosts lions, African Buffalo, elephants, Roan Antelope, Lelwel Hartebeest,
Olive Baboons and many others, was created in 1974 primarily to protect
endangered species. Sadly, today, the reckless regime in Ethiopia is selling a
major part of the Gambella National Park to Indian companies who are planning
huge farms on a land designated to protect endangered species. The Indian
company Karuturi has already started bulldozing the park endangering the
environment and one of Africa’s great animal migrations.
I hope we all
remember that some two years ago, the Ethiopian ministry of agriculture declared
that, whatever the wildlife credentials of the Gambella National Park, the park
had a huge agricultural investment potential. Today, sandwiched between the
Indian Agro giant Karuturi Global on one side and Mohammed Al Amoudi’s Saudi
Star on the other, the Gambella National Park that hosts the 2nd
largest mammal migrations in Africa is quickly being transformed into a large
foreign owned commercial farm jeopardizing the future of Gambella as a human
habitat and the great migration.
Blind
Investment Decisions
I remember, in the
1980s, Colonel Mengistu was the key decision maker behind every national and
regional investment endeavors. Today, the Colonel may have been gone for over
twenty years, but his brutality, stubbornness and ways of doing business are
still the major parts of the ethnic regime in Ethiopia. National and regional
economic priorities and alternative economic approaches mean little or nothing
to both Mengistu and Meles. They make decisions on the fly and the outcome does
not bother them as long as it meets their political goal.
Meles Zenawi has
made many nonsensical political and economic decisions, and one of them is his
decision to sell the nation’s fertile land to anyone that comes with dollar.
His recent decision to sell 100k hectares of land in Gambella is a blind
decision that totally failed to consider alternative uses of Gambella’s rich
resources. For example, tourism wise, Gambella has the same potential as Maasai
Mara, Amboseli and Tsavo National Parks in Kenya. Kenya’s tourism industry
employs 11% of the nations’ work force and generates 21% of Kenya’s foreign
exchange earnings. Ethiopia has the same, in fact, a much better tourism
potential than Kenya. What we don’t have is far sighted leaders who invest in
the future of Ethiopia. What angers the Ethiopian people is that such very
attractive alternatives were not even on the table when decisions were made to
sell Gambella’s land. The decision was all about money and selling land was the
quickest way.
The
cheapest fertile land on earth
One of the most
bizarre and uncomforting issues about the land grab in Ethiopia is the price the
Indian and Chinese companies are paying to acquire one of Africa’s most fertile
land. In my very short and mostly anxious life, I have seen the price of goods
and services go up and down, but I have never seen such rock bottom prices for a
quality good that has limited supply. It is so amazing that Karuturi Global had
not even seen the land when it was offered by the Ethiopian government. “It’s
very good land. It’s quite cheap. In fact, it is very cheap. We have no land
like this in India,” says Karmjeet Sekhon, project manager for farms in
Gambella. “There [India] you are lucky to get 1% of organic matter in the soil.
Here [Gambella, Ethiopia] it is more than 5%. We don’t need fertilizer or
herbicides. There is absolutely nothing that will not grow on it. By the way,
with all of these natural amenities and rock bottom prices, Karuturi still
enjoys a five years tax holiday.
Ethiopia is a
classic example of Africa’s inability to feed itself, hence, many Ethiopians
inside and outside the country argue that the government shouldn’t dispose its
farmers and sell the land to Indian and Chinese cash crop growers when more than
13 million of its own people depend on food aid. Ethiopia has a great mass of
arable land and many perennial rivers; moreover, it has a swarming population
whose occupation is largely agrarian. Therefore, it is embarrassing when
Ethiopia fails to feed itself, especially, when its government claims a seven
years of continuous ‘double digit economic growth’. Actually, it is even more
embarrassing to have a government that dispossesses land from its own citizens
and sells it cheap to foreigners who are in Ethiopia to secure food for their
own people.
According to the
contract signed between the Indian company Karaturi and the Ethiopian regime,
the annual lease rate per hectare is only 20 birr or about $1.17 which is less
than the value of a small quarter pounder in Seven Eleven. The value of the
contract is expressed in terms of birr, so every time the value of birr
depreciates so does the amount of dollar Ethiopia receives from Karuturi. The
contract expires in 2058 [after 50 years], and Karuturi pays 2million birr every
year for a total of 100 million birr in fifty years (20 x100, 000). This may
look like a huge sum of money, but it is only $5.8 million. Yes, fifty years,
100 thousand hectares of fertile land for only 5.8 million dollar.
Here is the most
shocking part of the contract. Meles Zenawi and his puppets here in the Diaspora
told us that one of the advantages of the land sale was that the party that buys
land builds infrastructure, schools, health facilities, and residential areas.
But, according to Article 3 of the contract, the lessee is not at all obliged to
build infrastructure, schools, health facilities, and residential areas. In
fact, it has clearly been stated in the contract that building anything on and
around the farm is the right of the lessee not an obligation. This makes it
clear that the sale of land to Indian and Chinese companies has nothing to do
with technology transfer; it is simply the transfer of Karaturi farming from
less fertile Indian fields to the more fertile lands of Ethiopia.
The architect of
Ethiopia’s land grab policy is none other than Meles Zenawi, but we must not
forget that there are many sold outs that perform the day to day activities of
the land sale. In this article I will expose the name and picture of Zenawi’s
henchman and the contractual document he signed with the Indian agro giant,
Karuturi Global Limited. I want every reader to closely look at the contractual
documents and see how shallow and un Ethiopian the TPLF regime is. May God bless
Ethiopia!
ebini23@yahoo.com
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