Africa is Open for Business, Not for Theft
As the global demand for palm oil surges, agribusiness companies have Africa in their sights. The promise of profits amid the prevailing myth of available land has meant hundreds of thousands of hectares of land being leased or sold to foreign corporations at giveaway prices. This expansion of large-scale plantations comes laced with promises of jobs, infrastructure development, and other gains for impoverished African nations and heralded as a development opportunity. However, a closer examination of some of the land deals unravels the consequences of this largely unrestrained and unregulated palm oil expansion.
The landowners were protesting the lack of transparency and proper consultation, inadequate compensation proposed for the loss of farmland, and the pressure put on landowners and chiefs to sign agreements. Mammy Thomas, an impacted villager from Pujehun who I met last year, challenged Socfin’s promises. “We are not against investments. But we told them that we had women that were pregnant, but they ignored us and they continue using the chemicals they want. There is no medical insurance, we have been telling them to increase the wages, so that it can take account of our medical needs, but up to now we have had nothing. We have no toilet facilities, no water source. The work has commenced. We are currently working in the nursery like myself. The payment is 250,000 Leones (about $50 a month) it is not enough to take care of one person,” she said.In Sierra Leone, Socfin Agricultural Company Sierra Leone (SOCFIN SL), a subsidiary of Socfin, which is controlled by French corporate titan Vincent Bolloré and the Belgian businessman Hubert Fabri, secured 6,500 ha of farmland for palm oil plantations. The $100 million investment promised jobs, compensation for lost farms, and infrastructure construction. However, opposition of the local population culminated in 40 villagers being arrested following a peaceful protest in 2011. Six local opponents were arrested in 2013 and are being sued by a local court on various accounts including conspiracy against the company.
The grievances made by Sierra Leonean farmers regarding Socfin’s palm oil plantations are virtually identical to those made by farming communities around the world regarding investments made by Socfin’s other subsidiaries. Similar practices of land grabs by Socfin subsidiaries and investment malpractice have been reported in recent years in Liberia, Cameroon, and Cambodia.
Similarly, New York-based Herakles Farms, whose land claim initially involved 73,000 hectares, branded its palm oil project with phrases such as sustainable, poverty reduction, and environmentally benign. Yet in practice its project in the Southwest region of Cameroon is riddled with legal controversies. Earlier this year, a report, Herakles Exposed, published by the Oakland Institute and Greenpeace International along with the company’s own internal documents, unveiled a familiar tale of greed and deceit.
Company documents published by the organizations exposed misrepresentation of the true nature of the proposed project to potential investors, the Cameroonian government, and the local communities. Despite fierce local opposition and plans to destroy a forested area of vital biodiversity surrounded by protected areas in order to establish a palm oil plantation, the Cameroonian government recently decided to award the company a three-year provisional land lease for some 20,000 hectares. The timing of the approval disproves Herakles Farm’s claim that it had all the necessary permits from the start, and confirms that the company has in fact been operating illegally for more than three years.
Unfortunately, Herakles Farms and Socfin’s palm oil plantations are not an anomaly and serve as a reminder that the land rush by foreign investors into African nations is not philanthropically driven. It is time to call on those who initially bought into the façade of the sustainable palm oil investment promising mega returns to help the local people free themselves from this greenwashed snare by demanding accountability.
This is not a rebuke to the very real efforts to bring infrastructure and development to Africa. However, it must serve as an imperative for the international community to proceed only with the understanding that Africa is open for business, not for theft.
Anuradha Mittal is the executive director of the Oakland Institute, a California based independent policy think tank which aims to address pressing social, economic and environmental issues.