Agriculture is usually not one of the subjects which is highlighted in this column. Yet, one has to be cognizant of the fact that agriculture is not only about putting a seed in the ground and nurturing it to maturity. Today, the field or discipline of agriculture is broader and impacts every aspect of life. If this fact is not appreciated, then one really does not have an understanding or appreciation of the role agriculture plays in today's global village.
The Bahamas is located in one of the most favourable geographical spaces in the world. This country has been blessed with proximity to the most powerful nation in the world; a nation endowed with virtually everything a nation state could want – wealth, human capital, size, abundance of a huge variety of natural and mineral resources and yes, the ability to feed itself and everyone else in the world, including us.
Yet, a stone's throw from our national boundary, millions of people are mired in poverty and live in conditions that lack many of the basic necessities of life such as clean water, healthcare facilities, schooling, access to land etc. In this regard, Haiti easily comes to mind.
In reviewing the history of food availability in The Bahamas, famine is a phenomenon which is virtually unknown to us. During the war years of the late 30s and early 40s, there were food shortages in certain commodities but not famine. Our land, despite some areas being called pine barrens and other areas pothole land, have yielded enough to feed our people either by cultivating crops or rearing animals. Additionally, we have extensive marine resources with its rich resource of protein from our fisheries, which have been a major food source until poultry became cheaper. For years poultry was the meat of choice for Sunday dinner.
Mankind today is faced with an entirely new cause for famine and one which breaks the historical mold of food crises. It isn't caused by weather, war, failed government policies or crop disease, all of which prevent or discourage farmers from bringing in a harvest. Rather, this is a food shortage caused by a disease that kills the farmers themselves. Recovery will not come with weather improvement, new government policies, a peace treaty or improved hybrid crops. Once the farmers die, there is no rain, or fertilizer that will make the empty uncultivated fields grow.
The closest we in The Bahamas have to this scenario is based in the tales we hear coming out of Haiti. For many countries, this is the reality of 21st century life hardest hit by this aspect of famine is Africa, particularly across southern Africa.
This dilemma stems from the continuing AIDS crisis which threatens to create chronic food shortages and leave large populations reliant for their survival on a long-term programme of international social welfare.
In South Africa, the region of the world hardest hit by AIDS, some seven million farmers have died from this epidemic. This has devastated the capacity of countries like Botswana, Swaziland, Lesotho, Namibia and, to some extent South Africa to produce food and feed their people, hence leave rural households in those countries with no means or experience to grow food.
Unlike Southern Africa, HIV/AIDS is centered in our urban centres of Nassau and Freeport and in many ways its spread in our society is tied to lifestyle. In Southern Africa, the epidemic is exacerbated by the fact that populations move frequently between rural homes and employment opportunities in the cities, on plantations or estates or in the mines where miners have been one of the main purveyors of the disease. Poor health networks hinder diagnosis and the scarcity of drugs impedes treatment. One of the biggest stumbling blocks is the ignorance about the disease and how it is spread, as well as the powerful taboo about acknowledging its presence and the methods of cure.
In reading the article which focused on this dimension of the AIDS pandemic, the impact on families and the degree of human suffering which the disease has wrought in some respect, is mind boggling for us who live in this part of the globe.
One of the human side effects is the fact that this disease has created millions of orphans in the farming districts of these countries. United Nation aid workers have found children who have not had any adult contact for months. Many of these countries do not have the social institutional infrastructure to address this huge social challenge.
This new twist to famine has not only created food shortages, but it continues to unravel societies and destabilize populations in a new way. There is no quick recovery. As food shortages increase, so does malnutrition, thereby making more people susceptible to other diseases. AIDS has become an element of impoverishment.
Bahamians take food availability for granted. For millions of people, this is not the case. What is also interesting is why. The AIDS crisis has affected a dimension of our society that we have often taken for granted. A country cannot produce food without farmers. In southern Africa, the states in that region of the world are facing food shortages because in great numbers a disease is killing their farmers. We, in The Bahamas, are losing our farmers simply because of old age and few incentives. The end result is the same: no farmers, no food.
By Godfrey Eneas, The Eneas Files, The Bahama Journal
