Online Roadshow: The potential of agriculture in enhancing Food Security in South Africa

Food security is a condition that exists when all people always have access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life. (FAO, 2006). Currently, over 50% of households in South Africa are food insecure, a situation that requires proactive measures to increase crop productivity. These measures include promoting urban agriculture, applying modern technologies such as hydroponics, as well as increasing land under irrigated agriculture. The need to meet the food requirements of a growing population though hydroponics and increasing cultivated land under irrigation need to allocate more water resources to the agriculture sector which already uses 63% of the available freshwater resources in the country. The main challenge is that South Africa is a water-scarce country and research shows that if the current water resources are not supplemented by 2025, the demand for water in the country will exceed supply [Local Government Budgets and Expenditure Review (LGBER), 2011]. At present, 98% of the available freshwater resources are already allocated, removing little or no room to increase the current allocable water.

Register for this WRC event here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_dq4xBBkZQY2hI-LOQZgcmw