Promoting Agricultural Value Chains:

In the OIC Member Countries

farming for meat and dairy production is also widespread. For most of these products, value

chains remain overwhelmingly local.

Particularly in the African OIC Member Countries, including Chad, Niger, Senegal, Uganda,

Sierra Leone, Sudan and Cote d’Ivoire, official government policies aim at boosting the

production of staples to enhance food security. Traditionally, cereal production is very

diversified in African OIC countries: millet is the principal cereal cultivated in many Sahel

countries (e.g. Mauritania, Mali, Chad, Niger), in coastal countries rice (Senegal, Sierra Leone)

or yams (Cote d’Ivoire, Cameroon) are most important; and in Central and Southern Africa

(Uganda, Mozambique) cassava and maize are the principal cereals. However, throughout the

entire region, a growing focus on rice production can be observed due to increasing demand in

the context of a growing population and changing consumption patterns away from millet and

maize.

In Arab OIC Member Countries, wheat and to a lesser extent barley are the main crops

cultivated as they are the staple food of the population and are also used as feed for livestock.

Most countries in the region have therefore established policies for subsidizing the production

of key crops. However, production in these countries takes place amidst a number of limiting

factors, including aridity, limited arable land, declining water resources, and poor soil quality

(Sadik, 2014). As this region is one of the most water scarce regions in the world, the

environmental distress caused by growing water shortage severely constrains domestic

production (Ahmed et al., 2013). Therefore, all Arab OIC countries are net importers of wheat.

Moreover, growing interest from Arab countries, especially Gulf countries, to use land overseas

to ensure food security can be observed since the 2008 spike in food prices. For instance, Qatar

is involved in agricultural overseas projects in Cambodia, the Philippines, Pakistan, Indonesia

and Vietnam; Egypt acquired land in Sudan and Uganda; and the United Arab Emirates

reportedly invested in projects in Pakistan, Morocco and Ethiopia.

These land acquisitions differ from agricultural investments in the past in several respects

(Cuffaro & Hallam, 2011). Firstly, the investors are resource seeking (land and water) instead

of market seeking. Secondly, they emphasise cultivation of basic food crops, including animal

feed, to be exported back to the investing country rather than for wider commercial export.

Finally, they involve acquisition of land and actual production rather than looser forms of joint

venture.

Box 1. Wheat production in Saudi Arabia: from self-sufficiency to complete import dependency within

a decade

Saudi Arabia’s arid climate, poor soil fertility, limited water supply and limited arable land (1.5 percent of the

total land area) severely restrict its agricultural potential. Nevertheless, the country was able to become self-

sufficient in wheat from the 1980s onwards. Revenues from oil and gas exports subsidised an expensive

agricultural strategy entailing interest free loans, support services, free seeds and fertilisers, low-cost water

and electricity and free land programmes (Ahmed et al. 2013). By the early 1990s, the country had even

become the world’s 6

largest exporter of wheat (Ahmed et al., 2013). However, in the mid-2000s it became

increasingly clear that the extensive agricultural production had depleted the country’s underground non-

renewable water resources.

This prompted a drastic policy shift in 2008 away from food self-sufficiency towards a more comprehensive

and sustainable food security strategy which follows a three-pronged approach (Al-Tkhais, 2014). Firstly,

government decided to continue producing some water-extensive commodities domestically, taking into

account the limited water resources. Wheat does not fall in this category and is to be reduced out by 12.5

percent annually with the goal of terminating production by 2016. Secondly, the private sector continues to

import food commodities and sell them domestically. Thirdly, the Saudi Arabia adopted the “King Abdullah’s

Initiative for Agricultural Investments Abroad”, which seeks to conclude agricultural investments in land-rich

countries for the production of food commodities.