Might Continued Emphasis on Maize at the Expense of More Drought Tolerant Crops Endanger Food Security in the Horn of Africa?

Maize is widely grown in Africa including in drier areas where alternate crops will often perform better. Although maize will fail in drought years, it produces substantially higher yields than alternates, such as sorghum and millet, in wet years. Although people tend to select which crops to grow based on recent experience with crop harvests and prices, there is a widespread preference for maize even in areas where planting it is risky. This can lead to crop failures when rainfall varies from year to year. Introduction of higher yielding maize varieties might, under some conditions, cause increases in food shortages by further incentivizing the planting of maize in inappropriate situations. A preliminary model helps to investigate this and related issues. Introduction Food shortages and famine are frequent occurrences in the Horn of Africa and in other drier parts of northeastern Africa. Climate models indicate that some of this area may be wetter in the future, some may be drier, and the likelihood of inter-annual variability will probably increase. Crop harvests will fluctuate more and prediction of harvest success for any given crop will become more difficult. Identifying the best avenues for agricultural research will also become more difficult. At present such research tends to focus on major crops to improve overall yield, disease resistance, grain storage properties, drought resistance and other attributes. Research tends to address problems related to those crops most widely grown in the area, and on crops that produce the highest yields and/or the best cash return. However, some of these same crops, maize in particular, tend also to be those which perform poorly in drought years compared to other crop options (such as millet or sorghum). If research is focused primarily on the highest yielding crops, larger scale issues of regional food availability in dry years may not be fully addressed. That is: as farmers plant larger areas of improved versions of these high yielding crops, the risk of food shortages during drought periods of may actually increase because larger areas will be at risk. Issues related to crop research for difficult development situations have been reviewed by Bellon (2006). Organizations funding research to improve specific crops have an interest in examining the larger agricultural and food systems so that research can emphasize crops, crop mixtures, and farming systems that will best prepare communities, and the region, to withstand adverse climate events. This paper examines the idea that problems of food