Bill Gates Gets into Farming
Posted: January 28, 2008
In the spirit of “teach a man to fish,” the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced Friday that it would greatly increase agricultural grants designed to reduce hunger and poverty in Africa and South Asia.
“If we are serious about ending extreme hunger and poverty around the world, we must be serious about transforming agriculture for small farmers,” Bill Gates, co-chairman of the foundation, said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
The new funds include grants to help improve soil quality and yields, assist research on hardier rice strains, provide better irrigation methods to small farmers and help develop superior coffee beans for export.
Gates said he regretted that support for agriculture in the developing world had been relatively neglected by his foundation but noted that it is a critical tool to drive development in rural areas.
It’s refreshing to see that kind of talk and action. All too often American do-gooders tend to take the “give a man a fish” approach and feed him for just a day. This kind of financial support has the potential to really make a difference by giving a hand up instead of just a hand out.
farmer Jay Said,
January 30, 2008 @ 8:19 am
Bill is wrong. In the USA over the past 150 years 199 of every 200 people have been removed from farming while increaseing production. Making farming in the USA more efficent thus allowing those 199 people to do something else in society. What the Gates support will do is just keep small farming small, ineffecent and just above the poverty line. Much like fair trade coffee. In the end the crop support and subsities will become 90% of their farm revenue. Grain farmers in the USA plan to make as little as $50 an acer/ $0.25 a bushel. African and South Asia small farmer’s can not produce at that level.
Gates would be better of moving small farmers into the city and find them new jobs to develope new economies in these developing countries. Moving 199 of 200 workers off the farm is painful but it was done in the USA and it can be done else where.