The switch to a more commercial crop by farmers near Abidjan is putting food supplies – and a cultural tradition – in jeopardy
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 28 February 2013 14.21 GMT
Large numbers of farmers began to take an interest in rubber in the past decade because of high prices resulting from a surge in global demand, Alphonse Gnaoré Koh, an expert from the National Rural Development Agency in Dabou, a rubber centre 50km west of Abidjan, told IRIN.
Prices jumped from 200 West African CFA francs (£0.26) per kilo in 2002 to 1,200 francs in 2007, but have fallen back since to 550 francs, he said. The rubber rush is pushing out farmers of cassava, said agro-economist Daouda Dahaux, from Abidjan's Swiss Centre for Scientific Research, and there is evidence that cocoa farmers may not reign supreme for long either.
Ivory Coast started to grow rubber industrially in the 1950s, and the crop became more widespread when village plantations were created in the 1980s, according to Koh. The crop was originally grown in the southern forest areas along the coast but is now spreading north, especially in central-western and central-eastern parts of the country.
Stable income
Farmers say rubber gives them a more stable and predictable income because they can harvest 10 months a year, whereas cassava is harvested only once a year. Moreover, harvesting cassava is demanding work compared with rubber, which is easier to grow, Dahaux said. A rubber tree can live for 40 years.
"With rubber, we harvest and are paid every month. It's like being a civil servant," said farmer Jean Essis N'Guessan, based in Debrimou, a village near Dabou. He started to plant rubber last year on his cassava farm and plans to replace all the cassava in three years, when the rubber trees will have grown. Natural rubber can be harvested seven years after the trees are planted.
His brother, David Esmel, is a retired civil servant and planted rubber along with cassava two years ago. "For many farmers, rubber is more important than cassava now," said N'Guessan. Revenues from rubber are much more substantial than from cassava, he said. "With rubber, you can have the lifestyle of someone working in Abidjan. It's attractive."
One hectare of rubber can provide a gross monthly income of about 400,000 francs (£530), said Koh. Ivory Coast's minimum salary is set at 36,600 francs per month.
Farmers' interest in rubber has been boosted by the political crisis over the past decade, said Dahaux. "In the face of political uncertainty, many people have opted for perennial crops."
Ivory Coast, Africa's top rubber grower and the seventh largest in the world, produced 230,000 tonnes of rubber last year, according to Albert Konan, executive secretary of the Rubber Development Fund. Annual production of 600,000 tonnes is envisaged by 2025, he said.
About two-thirds of the farmland in the Dabou region is used to grow rubber and the trend is on the rise, Koh said.
A cultural tradition in jeopardy?
However, cassava is widely used in southern Ivory Coast to produce attiéké, a side dish accompanying most meals, and the switch to rubber could lead to shortages.
"If nothing is done to support cassava, and if we consider the population growth in a city like Abidjan, there will likely be substantial shortages in 10-15 years," Dahaux said. "The threat is real."
In Debrimou, the first signs of cassava shortages have already appeared, inhabitants told IRIN. "There's less and less cassava in the region," said Madeleine Coulibaly, 48, a mother of three. "Without cassava, how will we eat in the future?"
Southern ethnic groups, including the Adioukrou from Dabou, are among those making balls of attiéké and selling them, but producers now have to travel up to 150km to buy cassava, the price of which has consequently risen, Coulibaly said. A ball of attiéké, which used to cost 250 francs a few years ago, now costs 350-400 francs, Koh said.
"Without cassava, Adioukrou women don't have anything to do," said Joséphine Koproyeï, 62.
The National Centre of Agronomic Research has created new varieties of cassava with better yields in the past few years, bringing women more autonomy and a sense of achievement. Coulibaly complained that this is not the case with rubber. "Our husbands are planting rubber for them, and only for them. It does not suit us," she said.
A cultural tradition is in jeopardy, stresses Jacques Lathes, chief of a neighbourhood in Débrimou. "Attiéké is part of the culture of the Adioukrou people. Our region derived its wealth from cassava. All the remaining cassava plantations are about to be invaded by rubber. This is worrying."
It is fascinating and troubling at the same time just how pervasive capitalism is into all social and commercial systems around the world, and how we are all so intertwined with its machinations and outcomes. Traditional cultures are irreversibly changed for economic reasons to the point that massive disruptions to cultures, even food supplies, can result. Even those of us involved in something as seemingly innocuous as rubber fetishism are not free of culpability in these matters...as if we didn't know that already.
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