COVID-19: a threat to food security?

Almost a year ago, on December 19th 2019, the world saw it's first case of coronavirus, by March 2020 the World Health Organisation declared the outbreak a pandemic. As of today, over 64 million cases have been recorded, making this year unlike any other. The current pandemic has affected our everyday lives and has posed a threat to our livelihoods. It therefore seems crucial to consider how it has affected those who were already at risk. In the context of this blog I thus want to look at the effects of COVID-19 on food security in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

Food security in SSA rests on a very delicate balance, therefore many experts were right in assuming that the continent would be severely disrupted by an event such as a global pandemic, as it had been in the past by the Ebola outbreak for example. Despite this, and against all odds, the cases in Africa did not amount to what was predicted (Telegraph, 2020).

However, the pandemic still poses a threat to food security in Sub-Saharan Africa, because of the extreme fragility of its food systems. This means although the pandemic in Africa has not reached the heights that it has in other continents, it has only served to exacerbate the already pre-existing challenges faced by the continent.

Safeguarding Africa's agricultural systems during the pandemic is about more than providing food. The agricultural sector employs almost 60% of the active population in SSA (World Bank, 2020), making it a key sector in most African economies, and the source of livelihood for many citizens. So what are the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on food security in Sub-Saharan Africa? 

Figure 1: The potential crops planting impacts of COVID-19 movement restrictions (Ayanlade and Radeny, 2020)

The first wave of national lockdown and movement restriction measures across the globe occurred in the first weeks of March, this coincided with the planting season for staple crops in SSA such as rice and maize in many countries — as is shown in Figure 1. At the beginning of the pandemic, there were concerns about border closures that would lead to low labour availability and mobility as well as low importations of food and raw materials (Ayanlade and Radeny, 2020)

In the horn and East Africa, the impacts of COVID have been devastating, and have only added to the tensions already present due to the desert locust invasion and floods. So far, it seems the crisis has disrupted both regional and global trade, and has slowed demand for African export products, however the impact has been localised and muted (McKinsey, 2020). 

Because of the possible repercussions of the pandemic and the vital nature of the agricultural system is SSA, it is therefore critical to avoid further disruption.

One of the ways we might intuitively think to avoid the negative impacts of COVID on agriculture would be to prevent the spread of the virus altogether, yet here lies another problem. According to the World Health Organisation, the best ways to prevent the spread of the virus is by wearing masks, social distancing and regularly washing our hands. Yet, social distancing seems unlikely to happen in some of  the informal settlements with high population density, and the poor access to safe water and sanitation presents a barrier when it comes to washing hands regularly (Anim and Ofori-Asenso, 2020).

The unpredictable nature of the pandemic renders it difficult to make any future predictions. SSA could still be further impacted by COVID. It is therefore imperative that governments maintain trade flows, and maintain agricultural production.

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