Spoils of soil? Unravelling an African soil management initiative

Have environmental pessimists exaggerated Africa’s soil fertility problems? How do networks of environmental scientists, bureaucrats and politicians coalesce and dissolve? What can analysis of a much-hyped multi-lateral initiative to combat soil degradation in Africa tell us about the post-Rio approach to international environmental governance?

These are among the questions posed in an Institute of Development Studies report which uses frank testimony from informants and a wealth of published and grey literature to tease out the complexities behind the conception, promotion and stagnation of the Soil Fertility Initiative (SFI) for Africa.

The analysis uses literary theory on the concept of narrative to illuminate how knowledge of Africa’s soil ‘crisis’ was created. When an over-simplified narrative was melded with scientific ‘facts’ it won World Bank and FAO endorsement and soared into the organizational stratosphere. Generalisations about environmental degradation and looming food-gap went unchallenged as charismatic zealots in the soil fertility community used glossy brochures and flashy websites to get key players on board. The involvement of agrochemical transnationals ensured that the SFI maintained a heavy emphasis on inorganic fertilizers .

By 1999 the power of the global narrative associated with the SFI had weakened. Key supporters lost enthusiasm for the SFI perceiving that it was too closely linked to the inorganic fertilizer agenda. The fragile coalitions built between and within the World Bank and FAO, and other SFI actors became harder to sustain when it came to moving from crisis rhetoric to plans for action. Today the SFI is little more than a disparate constellation of diverse interests, with little action on the ground.

Has SFI ended up as yet another example of ‘post-Rio syndrome’ – a diversionary and wasteful bureaucratic imperative to create action plans around global problems? Key findings emerging from the analysis include:

• The impossibility of determining how much money has been spent on SFI as activities have been diffuse and spread between many organizations and countries.
• Global activities may undermine rather than build capacity as key officials and scientists- of limited numbers in their home countries - get embroiled in the international conference circuit and diverted from valuable in-country activities.
• Resentment by many African stakeholders and parts of the scientific community of Washington/Rome dominance of what was supposed to be an international initiative.
• The key role of networks around Dutch soil science in shaping assumptions behind SFI.
• The way scientific data can acquire a life of its own and become authoritative through association with agencies/individuals of repute.
• The role of networks in suppressing dissenting opinions and unconventional science.

Policy pointers are:

• The need for more inclusive forms of deliberation in global policy debates to allow space for a diversity of scientific perspectives.
• Realising the rhetorical ideas of local perspectives and participation requires major attitudinal changes among the global policy-making elite.

Source(s):
‘Global Science, Global Policy: Local to Global Policy Processes for Soils Management in Africa’ by James Keeley and Ian Scoones, IDS Working Paper 115, 2000 Full document.

Funded by: UK Department for International Development, NEDA

id21 Research Highlight: 15 May 2001

Further Information:
James Keeley
Institute of Development Studies
University of Sussex
Falmer
Brighton BN1 9RE
UK

Tel: +44 (0)1273 606261
Fax: 44 (0)1273 621202/691647
Contact the contributor: jamesk@ids.ac.uk

Institute of Development Studies (IDS), UK

Other related links:
'Highland Ethiopia: permanent basket-case?'

IIED Drylands programme aims to promote the sustainable management of natural resources in Africa

IIED Management of Soil Fertility and Water Conservation

FAO focuses on Desertification