Ask ten people their first thoughts when they think about agriculture in Africa and my guess is that you’ll get a litany of grim perceptions. The word “famine” will probably appear fairly early on, as will “primitive” and a host of other stereotyped words. The one you likely won’t hear is “bullish” or “flourishing.” Yet it appears that there are some who are incredibly optimistic about the prospects for the continent’s agricultural development, particularly in West and North Africa (and they might want to take a look South as well, for notwithstanding Zimbabwe’s descent from its “breadbasket of Africa” status, South Africa has a flourishing agricultural economy).
