Wrong in too many levels!

I watched this Guardian video with absolute disappointment and anger. Most people of African decent approach Western coverage of any topic with suspicions and as an Ethiopian American my understanding of that feeling is still intact. That said, some of us, who are really critical of the land grab happening in Ethiopia, are aware of this problem and Guardian coverage did a fairly decent job.

As any problem arising in the horn of Africa, There are always the pros and cons to consider. The fans of the Government’s move like to point out the need to make bitter choices by opening up Ethiopia to those with resources to use the land and in the meantime create jobs and other social infrastructure like schools and medical centers. They say, rightfully so, Ethiopia was closed for business for the last half century and look where it get us.
So they endorse the reckless summery land award to whoever come up with money regardless of what is planned to be harvested in the land, who will benefit from it and also without any consideration to the rights and well being of the people that lived and existed there for centuries.

We all remember this argument when the government was moving people from their neighborhood and bulldozed their shacks and award the land to the so called investors, some of them borrowed money from the government and fled with it to oversees leaving the buildings unfinished, and some of them actually constructed buildings that have a higher rent scale which leave them to be unrented and also some surrender the land awarded to them to the government because the land sat idolly while they use the title to put their hands on other loans using the land as collateral. In the meantime, the poor was thrown out it’s town without a proper consideration to it’s rights or well being.

What makes the move to award large scale lands to companies like Karuturi Global scary is the utter disregard to workers right, use of unregulated child labor, unapologetic disregard to the starving natives and the lack of care to the land or the longtime ecosystem of the country.

Besides the weird nature of being the lead country to export food to nations like Saudi Arabia and India while millions of it’s citizens starve, what is the morel explanation of awarding huge land to (size of Wales) to companies and individuals with next to nothing price for almost a century? How are we justifying begging developed nations for a Food Aid while we export food to other nations. This move set some of us ,who are trying to stop Western stereotype of Ethiopia as a starving nation, back because we are not only starving but we do it voluntarily.

In the time where the world is very conscious of natural resources, like water land and energy, Ethiopian government is doing exactly the opposite of it in exchange for very little for the countries future.

So far we know, the promised infrastructures that are promised to the natives are not delivered. Ethiopians are now working next to nothing in a rice field that will be served in the dining tables of Saudi Arabia.

In my opinion, this is wrong in too many levels!






UPDATE
Saudi Billionaire Plans to Invest $2.5 Billion to Build Ethiopia Rice Farm
Wednesday, 23 March 2011

Addis Ababa, March 23 (WIC) - Saudi Star Agricultural Development Plc, a food company owned by billionaire Sheikh Mohammed al- Amoudi, said it plans to invest $2.5 billion by 2020 developing a rice-farming project in Ethiopia.

The company, based in Addis Ababa, leased 10,000 hectares (24,711 acres) in Ethiopia’s western Gambella region for 60 years at a cost of 158 birr ($9.42) per hectare annually, Chief Executive Officer Haile Assegide said in an interview on March 18. It plans to rent an additional 290,000 hectares from the government, he said.

The project forms part of the Horn of Africa nation’s plan to lease 3 million hectares, an area about the size of Belgium, to private investors over the next 2 ½ years. Critics including GRAIN, the Barcelona-based advocacy group, have argued that domestic farmers are being dispossessed and the country shouldn’t rent land cheaply to foreign investors to grow cash crops when about 13 percent of its approximately 80 million people still rely on food aid.

“There is lots of land in Ethiopia, especially in the lowland areas,” Haile said. “So, if you develop this lowland area and make Ethiopia self-sufficient in food, I see no problem.”

Karuturi Global Ltd. (KARG), an Indian food processor, plans to produce commodities including palm oil, sugar and rice on 312,000 hectares of rented land in Ethiopia.

‘Villagization’

The Agriculture Ministry announced in November it plans to relocate 45,000 households, or about three-quarters of the population of Gambella, by mid-2013. Almost half of the region’s population is made up of the semi-nomadic Lou Nuer people, according to the 2007 Population and Housing Census.

The government says the so-called villagization program is aimed at improving public-service delivery and is not linked to investments in land.

“Where we have leased, there is no settler,” Haile said. “In the future, there might be some resettlement.”

When previous projects of Saudi Star’s parent company, Midroc Ethiopia Plc, have displaced people, it has compensated people, resettled them and provided public services including schools, health clinics and loans, according to Haile.

Over the past 15 months, Saudi Star spent $140 million buying equipment, clearing part of the land in Gambella and developing a 25-hectare trial plot, he said. Another 130,000 hectares has been allocated and there are plans to lease a further 160,000, Haile said. Ethiopia, Africa’s second-most populous nation with about 83 million people, bars private land ownership.

Saudi Exports

Other crops including sunflowers and corn will be grown in areas not suitable for rice, Haile said.

Two-thirds of the food produced will be exported by Saudi Star, with Saudi Arabia likely to be a “very dominant” market, while the rest will be sold domestically, according to Haile. This month, the Ethiopian Foreign Ministry said the agreement with Saudi Star required the company to sell 40 percent domestically, while 60 percent could be shipped offshore.

“There is no government policy to my knowledge,” Haile said.

Saudi Star’s farm will eventually produce as much as 1.5 million metric tons of rice a year and directly employ 250,000 people, in part because of a strategy to reduce mechanization.

“We don’t want to make it capital intensive,” he said. “We want to make it a mix of labor and capital”.

Rough rice for May delivery fell less than 0.1 percent to $13.85 per 100 pounds on the Chicago Board of Trade at 8:58 a.m. Nairobi time.

Saudi Arabian businesses invested more than any other country in Ethiopia over the past five years, the Ethiopian News Agency reported in December. Ethiopia plans to attract foreign and domestic investment of 703 billion birr over the next five years, according to the agency.

Al-Amoudi, 66, is the world’s 63rd richest person and the second-wealthiest in Saudi Arabia with assets worth $12.3 billion, according to Forbes magazine’s annual global ranking of billionaires.(bloomberg.com)