Evans School Policy Analysis & Research Group (EPAR)

Over the past 20 years, global wheat production and consumption have increased significantly. Production has increased 28%, or about 1.3% annually, and consumption has increased about 24%, or 1.1% annually. A small number of countries consistently account for over 90% of the export market, but the import market is more diversified and involves many more countries. Wheat is primarily used for food, seed, and industry; only 20% of wheat production is used for animal feed. This brief provides a global overview of the wheat value chain, but with specific attention to three focus countries: Ethiopia, India (specifically the Bihar region), and Bangladesh. While these three countries currently have a limited impact in the global wheat market, projections of wheat production and demand suggest that over the next 20 years demand in Bangladesh and Ethiopia will increasingly exceed supply, while India will become a net importer by 2030.

This brief presents selected material from the Fourth African Agricultural Markets Program (AAMP) policy symposium, Agricultural Risks Management in Africa: Taking Stock of What Has and Hasn’t Worked, organized by the Alliance for Commodity Trade in Eastern and Southern Africa and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa that took place in Lilongwe, Malawi, September 6-10, 2010.  We draw almost exclusively from Rashid and Jayne’s summary, “Risk Management in African Agriculture: A review of experiences.”  This article summarizes across the background papers, with major findings grouped into three broad categories: cross cutting, government-led policies, and modern instruments.

The purpose of this literature review is to provide qualitative and quantitative examples of technologies, constraints and incentives for efficient waste treatment and reuse in Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia.  We present relevant case studies and expert observations and experiences on the nutrient content in urine and feces, contaminants frequently found in untreated sludge and wastewater, waste treatment technologies that may be relevant for low-income countries, risks associated with waste reuse, benefits to resource recovery in agriculture. We further discuss reasons for waste treatment failures, including urbanization, observations on challenges with market-driven reuse in less developed countries, and examples of net-positive energy facilities in Europe and the United States. Much of the evidence presented in the literature relates to wastewater treatment processes or the sludge produced from wastewater treatment as opposed to untreated fecal sludge.  However, examples of risks, failures, and opportunities for raw sludge treatment and reuse are discussed when available.  In some cases, empirical evidence or case studies were not available for developing countries and alternatives are presented.  Overall we found the empirical evidence on waste treatment and reuse in developing countries is quite thin.