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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | 80% of grants for finding solutions to improve agricultural yield spent in US, UK, Europe -Kounteya Sinha

80% of grants for finding solutions to improve agricultural yield spent in US, UK, Europe -Kounteya Sinha

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published Published on Nov 5, 2014   modified Modified on Nov 5, 2014
-The Times of India

LONDON: Majority of the $3 billion spent by the world's leading philanthropic organization - the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on finding solutions around improved agricultural yield to benefit the world's poorest and hungry people, has been spent in the US, Britain and other rich developed nations.

Grain, a research group based in Barcelona said on Tuesday that over 80% of the grants were given to organizations in the US and Europe, and only 10% to groups in Africa.

"By far the main recipient country is the US, followed by the UK, Germany and the Netherlands," it says in a report published on Tuesday.

Of the $678 million given to universities and national research centres, 79% went to the US and Europe, and only 12% to Africa.

America was the biggest recipient of Gates agricultural grants meant to benefit farmers in poor countries: $880 million dished out in 254 grants. Recipients include US universities and research institutions to produce for crop varieties and biotechnology research for farmers in Africa (like Cornell University, $90m in 12 grants).

UK was the second biggest recipient, total of 25 grants with a focus on academic research amounting to over $ 150 million - such as for the University of Greenwich to work on cassava value chains in several African countries (16.6 m), the University of Cambridge to work on epidemiological modelling on wheat and cassava diseases ($4.2m) and the John Innes Centre to test the feasibility cereal crops capable of fixing nitrogen ($9.8m).

India received around $41 million worth of grants - total of ten grants including two grants to PRADAN ($30.8m for women farmers training), and to BAIF ($6.3 m. for establishment of cattle development centres).

Interestingly, one of the findings is that the Gates Foundation buys political influence.

Grain said "Does the Gates Foundation use its money to tell African governments what to do? Not directly. The Gates Foundation set up the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa in 2006 and has supported it with $414 million since then. It holds two seats on the Alliance's board and describes it as the "African face and voice for our work". AGRA, like the Gates Foundation, provides grants to research programmes. It also funds initiatives and agribusiness companies operating in Africa to develop private markets for seeds and fertilizers through support to "agro-dealers" An important component of its work, however, is shaping policy".

"AGRA intervenes directly in the formulation and revision of agricultural policies and regulations in Africa on such issues as land and seeds. It does so through national policy action nodes of experts, selected by AGRA, that work to advance particular policy changes.

In a similar vein, the Gates Foundation provides Harvard University with funds to promote discussion of biotechnology in Africa, Michigan University with a grant to set up a centre to help African policymakers decide on how best to use biotechnology, and Cornell University with funds to create a global "agricultural communications platform" so that people better understand science-based agricultural technologies".

In June this year, the total amount given as grants to food and agriculture projects by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation surpassed the $3 billion mark. It marked quite a milestone. From nowhere on the agricultural scene less than a decade ago, the Gates Foundation has emerged as one of the world's major donors to agricultural research and development".

Grain said "The Gates Foundation is arguably the biggest philanthropic venture ever. It currently holds a $40 billion endowment, made up mostly of contributions from Gates and his billionaire friend Warren Buffet. The foundation has over 1,200 staff, and has given over $30 billion in grants since its inception in 2000, $3.6 billion in 2013 alone. Most of the grants go to global health programmes and educational work in the US, traditionally the foundation's priority areas. But in 2006-2007, the foundation massively expanded its funding for agriculture, with the launch of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and a series of large grants to the international agricultural research system (CGIAR). In 2007, it spent over half a billion dollars on agricultural projects and has maintained funding at around this level. The vast majority of the foundation's agricultural grants focus on Africa. Spending so much money gives the foundation significant influence over agricultural research and development agendas".

GRAIN looked through the foundation's publicly available financial records to see if the actual flows of money support these critiques.

"We combed through all the grants for agriculture that the Gates Foundation gave between 2003 and September 2014. We found that the The Gates Foundation fights hunger in the South by giving money to the North. Roughly half of the foundation's grants for agriculture went to four big groupings: the CGIAR's global agriculture research network, international organisations (World Bank, UN agencies), AGRA (set up by Gates itself) and the African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF). The other half ended up with hundreds of different research, development and policy organizations across the world. Of this last group, over 80% of the grants were given to organizations in the US and Europe, 10% went to groups in Africa, and the remainder elsewhere. By far the main recipient country is Gates's own home country, the US, followed by the UK, Germany and the Netherlands".

"When it comes to agricultural grants by the foundation to universities and national research centres across the world, 79% went to grantees in the US and Europe, and a meagre 12% to recipients in Africa. The North-South divide is most shocking, however, when we look at the NGOs that the Gates Foundation supports. One would assume that a significant portion of the frontline work that the foundation funds in Africa would be carried out by organizations based there. But of the $669 million that the Gates Foundation has granted to non-governmental organizations for agricultural work, over three quarters has gone to organizations based in the US. Africa-based NGOs get a meagre 4% of the overall agriculture-related grants to NGOs".

The single biggest recipient of grants from the Gates Foundation is the CGIAR, a consortium of 15 international agricultural research centres. In the 1960s and 70s, these centres were responsible for the development and spread of a controversial Green Revolution model of agriculture in parts of Asia and Latin America which focused on the mass distribution of a few varieties of seeds that could produce high yields - with the generous application of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

Grain said "The CGIAR centres have received over $720 million from Gates since 2003. During the same period, another $678 million went to universities and national research centres across the world - over three-quarters of them in the US and Europe - for research and development of specific technologies, such as crop varieties and breeding techniques. We could find no evidence of any support from the Gates Foundation for programmes of research or technology development carried out by farmers or based on farmers' knowledge, despite the multitude of such initiatives that exist across the continent".


The Times of India, 4 November, 2014, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/uk/80-of-grants-for-finding-solutions-to-improve-agricultural-yield-spent-in-US-UK-Europe/articleshow/45035680.cms


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