Africa Is a Country

The Land Question

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

The Land Question

By
Sean Jacobs

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yGkJsR7-HY]

The Guardian’s John Vidal reports from Ethiopia’s remote Gambella region where in the last 10 years “1.1 million hectares, nearly a quarter of its best farmland” have been sold or leased to foreign companies by the Ethiopian government. The Ethiopian government says 36 countries including India, China, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have leased farm land there. The World Bank estimates that at least 35 million hectares of land has been bought or leased on the continent as a whole. Vidal reports that 896 companies-including the “Saudi billionaire Al Amoudi, who is constructing a 20-mile canal to irrigate 10,000 hectares to grow rice”–have come to the region in the last three years. Poor, rural people are convinced by Ethiopia’s government “to leave their farmland to make way for foreign owned companies growing profit crops for export.” The companies hire the locals to work on the farms and pay them an average wage of one US dollar a day. As usual the Ethiopian government spokesman–the government receives tons of food aid while they sell off land–acts like nothing is going on.

Further Reading

On Safari

On our year-end publishing break, we reflect on how 2024’s contradictions reveal a fractured world grappling with inequality, digital activism, and the blurred lines between action and spectacle.

Rebuilding Algeria’s oceans

Grassroots activists and marine scientists in Algeria are building artificial reefs to restore biodiversity and sustain fishing communities, but scaling up requires more than passion—it needs institutional support and political will.

Ibaaku’s space race

Through Afro-futurist soundscapes blending tradition and innovation, Ibaaku’s new album, ‘Joola Jazz,’ reshapes Dakar’s cultural rhythm and challenges the legacy of Négritude.

An allegiance to abusers

This weekend, Chris Brown will perform two sold-out concerts in South Africa. His relationship to the country reveals the twisted dynamic between a black American artist with a track record of violence and a country happy to receive him.

Shell’s exit scam

Shell’s so-called divestment from Nigeria’s Niger Delta is a calculated move to evade accountability, leaving behind both environmental and economic devastation.

Africa’s sibling rivalry

Nigeria and South Africa have a fraught relationship marked by xenophobia, economic competition, and cultural exchange. The Nigerian Scam are joined by Khanya Mtshali to discuss the dynamics shaping these tensions on the AIAC podcast.

The price of power

Ghana’s election has brought another handover between the country’s two main parties. Yet behind the scenes lies a flawed system where wealth can buy political office.

Beats of defiance

From the streets of Khartoum to exile abroad, Sudanese hip-hop artists have turned music into a powerful tool for protest, resilience, and the preservation of collective memory.