African Farmers Must Dump Organic Farming

Over-reliance on organic farming has seen Africa reap hunger and economic stagnation in rural areas (Canadafreepress.com; accessed December 8, 2011). Dennis T. Avery (DirectorCenter for Global Food Issues – Hudson Institute) observes that a Nigerian field has 200 million weed seeds per hectare and an African woman spends 300 hours per hectare per season in hand weed control. Un-weeded fields lead to 55 – 90% losses in maize harvest; 50 – 100% in rice and 5 tons of cassava loss per hectare.