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Agriculture Sector Research Highlights

The Report: Ghana 2024
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Agriculture Sector Analysis

In addition to being a major source of foreign exchange, the agriculture sector accounts for a significant portion of the country’s employment, as an estimated 75% of the rural population worked in the sector...

Focus Report: Exploring the role of women and youth in Africa's agriculture sector

The last few years have seen marked developments in the dynamic landscape of African agriculture. The continent’s cultivated land has expanded significantly since 2020, contributing to 52%...

Improving the resilience of Africa’s agriculture sector

Despite being home to 60% of the world’s arable land, Africa has yet to unlock its full agricultural potential. The 2023 edition of the “Agriculture in Africa Focus Report”, produced in partnership with OCP Group...

The Report: Abu Dhabi 2023
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Agriculture & Food Security Sector Analysis

Abu Dhabi, occupying 84% of the UAE’s landmass, plays a crucial role in agriculture and food security. The emirate is investing significantly in strengthening supply and value chains to enhance...

Special Reports on the Agriculture Sector
Focus Report

Focus Report: How can agriculture in Africa meet the challenges of the future?

While Africa has the potential to feed the world's population in the coming years, in order to accomplish this, land must be developed sustainably by addressing pressing issues such as deforestation...
Covid-19 Response Report

Report: Can agri-tech offer sustainable solutions to GCC food security challenges?

Food production in the GCC has long faced obstacles ranging from water scarcity to a lack of arable soil – factors that are being exacerbated by climate change. Prior to Covid-19, imports accounted for 85% of the...
Focus Report

Focus report: Opportunities and challenges in Zimbabwe’s sugar industry

As one of the largest formal employers in Zimbabwe, the sugar industry's growth potential is significant. Although challenges remain – including a lack of financing and mechanisation...
Focus Report

Focus Report: Agriculture at the heart of Nigeria's economic development plans

Recent years have seen renewed policy focus on agriculture as an important source of revenue for a diversified Nigerian economy, with plans to revitalise the sector centred on increasing local production...

Focus Report: How can agriculture in Africa meet the challenges of the future?
Report: Can agri-tech offer sustainable solutions to GCC food security challenges?
Focus report: Opportunities and challenges in Zimbabwe’s sugar industry
Focus Report: Agriculture at the heart of Nigeria's economic development plans
 

How ESG is creating opportunities across African economies

This video explores how environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles are creating new opportunities for sustainable development across African economies. Governments across sub-Saharan Africa...

The Report: Misrata 2024
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Agriculture and Food Industry Sector Analysis

While Misrata has traditionally relied on industries such as manufacturing and trade, the agriculture sector and food segment have been quietly gaining momentum in recent years. Misrata’s relatively...

Agriculture Sector Analyses

Overview

Ghana agriculture expanding due to innovative farming methods
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Agriculture is a major driver of economic growth in Ghana, as well as an important source of foreign exchange. In 2021 the amount of arable land was estimated at 20.7% of the country’s 238,500 sq km. That same year roughly 39.5% of Ghana’s workforce was employed in the agriculture sector, while the African Development Bank (AfDB) approximated in a February 2023 report that the sector employed roughly 75% of the country’s rural population. In recent years the government has undertaken a number of initiatives to improve...

Interview

Muhammadu Muzzammil, Country Director, ECOM Agrotrade
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While the country boasts favourable conditions, the current import-dependent status of various crops has limited the role of the private sector in the agriculture value chain. Meanwhile, farmers are unable to provide sufficient quantities of products to satisfy demand, due in part to a lack of improved seed types and inadequate post-harvest management...

Analysis

Ghana boosting agriculture production and increasing exports
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Ghana is the second-largest cocoa producer in the world after Côte d’Ivoire, accounting for a global market share of 20%. The crop, which grows primarily in the Ashanti, Brong-Ahafo, Eastern, Western, Western North and Western South regions, is cultivated by families, communities and cooperatives. The cocoa grown in Ghana is mostly processed for export, as the local market for finished cocoa products is relatively limited. Nestlé Ghana, Cargill and Unilever Ghana are the primary suppliers of cocoa...

Analysis

Countries developing aquaculture to support food security
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With per capita fish consumption having doubled in the past six decades, aquaculture is becoming increasingly important when it comes to combatting food insecurity. Recent innovations seek to improve sustainability and productivity while assuaging quality concerns. Venture capitalists invested $39bn in food tech start-ups in 2021, double the amount seen in 2020. While over half of this amount went to digital grocers and online marketplaces, a number of companies developing innovative aquaculture technologies stand...

Analysis

Regenerative farming to help mitigate climate change and create jobs
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In light of the Covid-19 pandemic, supply chain disruptions and broader environmental concerns, many countries are looking to improve the efficiency of agriculture while reducing their carbon footprint. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which curtailed exports of maize, wheat and cooking oil from two of the world’s key producers, has given this more impetus and raised broader concerns about global food security...

Report: How can West and Central Africa use ESG to boost value-added activities in special economic zones?

Several West and Central African countries have incorporated the UN Sustainable Development Goals in their respective economic growth strategies, driven by a desire from both public and private...

Agriculture in Emerging Markets

Economic News

In infographics: Boosting local value added in agricultural commodities in Côte d’Ivoire
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Côte d’Ivoire agriculture sector, which accounts for roughly one-fifth of GDP and employs two-thirds of the population, is a core sector of the economy with global significance. The country is a key exporter of cocoa, cashew nuts, palm oil, bananas, coffee, rubber, kola nuts and cotton. Côte d’Ivoire is the world’s leading cocoa producer and shares the title of number-one cocoa grinder with the Netherlands. It is also the top cashew nut exporter and was the leading producer of sweet bananas in 2017...

Economic News

How agri-tech start-ups are driving investment in emerging markets
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Even as global funding levels drop, agri-tech start-ups remain a key driver of investment in emerging markets as they work to make farming greener, more productive and more climate resilient. Global investment in agri-tech start-ups totalled $10.6bn in 2022, down 13% from 2021 – a record funding year for global start-ups – but ahead of the 2020 figure of $7bn. This matched a general downwards trend in venture capital activity, as investors became more cautious amid global headwinds and deepening fears of recession...

Podcast

Sustainability at the heart of African agriculture

Bernardo Bruzzone, Regional Editor for Africa at Oxford Business Group, speaks with Professor Bruno Gérard, Head of the Agrobiosciences department at Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), about the opportunities and challenges present nowadays in the African agriculture sector. Africa has the potential to feed the world’s population in the coming years, however, there is room for more private investment to strengthen and modernise the sector in a continent where more than 70% of the population lives from agriculture.

Economic News

Exploring the future of sustainable aquaculture in emerging markets
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With per capita fish consumption having doubled in the past six decades, aquaculture is becoming more important in combatting food insecurity. Recent innovations seek to improve sustainability and productivity while assuaging quality concerns. Venture capitalists invested $39bn in food tech start-ups in 2021, double the amount seen in 2020. While over half of this amount went to digital grocers and online marketplaces, a number of companies developing innovative aquaculture technologies stand to benefit from...

Economic News

Nigeria targets agro-processing as a future growth driver
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As Nigeria looks to restructure its economy to be more diversified and sustainable, agro-processing is emerging as a key tool to improve agricultural value added while also bolstering the sector’s status as a driver of economic growth. As in many African countries, agriculture has long been an important part of Nigeria’s economy – not only in terms of food production, but also in terms of its economic impact and contribution to the overall workforce. However, the discovery of oil in the 1950s and the subsequent development...

Economic News

Can sustainable agriculture address global food security?
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In light of the Covid-19 pandemic, supply chain disruptions and broader environmental concerns, many countries are looking to improve the efficiency of agriculture while also reducing its carbon footprint. The drive for sustainable agriculture has gained impetus in recent months, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which curtailed exports of maize, wheat and cooking oil from two of the world’s key producers – raising broader concerns about global food security. Supply constraints are being exacerbated by climate concerns...

Economic News

How are MENA nations moving to bolster food security?
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Nations in the MENA region have been intensifying efforts to increase their food security, with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine the most recent geopolitical event to underline the fragility of global supply chains, as well as the importance of agricultural self-sufficiency. Together, Russia and Ukraine account for around 29% of the world’s wheat supply, pointing to the significant risk – in terms of both availability and price – to major grain-importing countries as a result of the escalating conflict. Egypt is the world’s largest wheat...

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