60% of Africa’s food is based on wheat, rice and maize – the continent’s crop treasure trove is being neglected

By Tafadzwanashe Mabhaudhi

African countries have become reliant on a few food items. Just 20 plant species now provide 90% of our food, with three – wheat, maize and rice – accounting for 60% of all calories consumed on the continent and globally. This deprives the continent of diverse food sources, at the very time when research has found massive food and nutrition insecurity in Africa.

By 2020, about 20% of the continent’s population (281.6 million) faced hunger. This figure is likely to have increased, given the impacts of successive droughts, floods and COVID-19.

Yet historically, Africa had 30,000 edible plant species, and 7,000 were traditionally cultivated or foraged for food. The continent is a treasure trove of agrobiodiversity (a diversity of types of crops and animals) and its countries could easily feed themselves.

As society and agriculture evolved, many foods that defined diets and sense of self on the