Food Dependency in Sub-Saharan Africa: Simply a Matter of ‘Vulnerability’, or Missed Development Opportunity?

Abstract

This article seeks to refocus some of the attention devoted in the past several decades to the issue of food security in sub-Saharan Africa to the broader context of food dependency. Using panel data for 44 countries over a period of 51 years (1961–2011), the article tests several hypotheses drawn from Lewis's classical model of development characterized by ‘unlimited supplies of labour’. The model requires either rising agricultural productivity (the closed model) or imports of global market foodstuffs (the open model) to ensure the low food prices and wages required for capital accumulation. Empirical results reject a positive association between food dependency, as represented by five decades of increasing per capita grain imports, and any measurable level of economic modernization with sufficient forward momentum to spur or justify such dependency. Results suggest instead a significant correlation between increasing food dependency and separate panel time periods associated with differing trade and policy regimes. More importantly, empirical results call for a re-evaluation of Lewis's original development model, focusing on the pivotal role of a supported food subsistence sector in creating economic possibilities for development.