Brazil and Japan plotted a farming revolution in Mozambique
Nov 14th 2019NAMPULASQUINT AT THE grasslands of northern Mozambique and they look a bit like the cerrado, a savannah in central Brazil. Could they be transformed by intensive farming, just as the thickets of the cerrado have given way to fields of soya that transformed Brazil from a food importer to one of the world’s great breadbaskets? That was the thought behind Prosavana, a programme bringing Brazilian and Japanese expertise to Mozambique. Initiated in 2009, it aimed to lift agricultural production across an area of 107,000 square kilometres, roughly the size of Bulgaria.Politicians heralded Prosavana as a landmark example of “South-South” co-operation. Few farming projects in Africa could match its ambition. It painted a future of which many agronomists on the continent dream: productive and commercially astute smallholder farmers and large plantations exporting to the world. Yet it became a study in hubris, and an illustration of why top-down schemes so often fall short of expectations.Choose us for news analysis that respects your time and intelligenceSubscribe to The EconomistWe filter out the noise of the daily news cycle and analyse the trends that matterWe give you rigorous, deeply researched and fact-checked journalism. That’s why Americans named us their most trusted news source in 2017Available wherever you are—in print, digital and, uniquely, in audio, fully narrated by professional broadcastersThis website adheres to all nine of NewsGuard‘s standards of credibility and transparency.ORContinue reading this articleRegister with an email address