{"id":10,"date":"2010-01-19T16:50:21","date_gmt":"2010-01-19T16:50:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/?p=10"},"modified":"2026-03-11T15:04:23","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T12:04:23","slug":"saudi-arabia-dreams-of-food-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/saudi-arabia-dreams-of-food-security\/","title":{"rendered":"Saudi Arabia dreams of food security"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

How conserving water won over agricultural production<\/h2>\n<\/blockquote>\n

March 2009<\/h4>\n

During the oil boom of the 1970s the third world dreamed of a new <\/span><\/em>international economic order and the West threatened to use food as a <\/span><\/em>weapon. Since then Saudi Arabia has sought to secure its food supply through <\/span><\/em>its own production or investment abroad<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

by Alain Gresh<\/span><\/p>\n

The date-processing factories all along the desert road from Riyadh to Al-Kharj are a reminder that Saudi Arabia is the world\u00b9s biggest producer of <\/span>dates. On the outskirts of Al-Kharj a large sign announces the Prince Sultan air base where, famously, US troops were stationed until 2003. A few <\/span>kilometres further on, the road forks and you come to a well-guarded gate\u00a0with a sign above it saying \u00b3Al-Safi \u00ad the world\u00b9s largest integrated dairy<\/span>
\n farm\u00b2. Here, the car is disinfected and cleared to continue on its way. In the plant\u00b9s reception area a photocopied page from the 1998 Guinness Book of Records giving its vital statistics is on display: then, it had 24,000 cows <\/span>and covered 3,500 hectares. Now there are 37,000 head of cattle: black and <\/span>white Holsteins, originally imported from Canada, which are artificially<\/span>
\n inseminated. The male calves are killed for meat and the females go into <\/span>milk production.<\/span><\/p>\n

Adapting dairy farming to Saudi Arabia\u00b9s climate hasn\u00b9t been easy. <\/span>Refrigeration units are needed to maintain a temperature below 27C in the <\/span>cowsheds and mobile sunscreens protect the animals from the scorching heat. <\/span>Milking is automated and computer-controlled. On the same site is the dairy <\/span>processing plant, which is also automated. It\u00b9s run by the French company <\/span>Danone, a partner in the project since 2001. The farm produces 220m litres <\/span>of milk per annum, which supplies one-third of the country\u00b9s needs.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Al Safi company was the brainchild of a visionary who died two years <\/span>ago, Prince Abdullah Al Faisal, the older brother of the present foreign <\/span>minister. One of the prince\u00b9s proposed schemes was to tow icebergs from the <\/span>North Pole to satisfy the country\u00b9s water requirements. He also wanted to <\/span>make the country self-sufficient in milk. Karim Mansour, Al Safi-Danone\u00b9s <\/span>young director, explained: \u00b3We get very high yields: a daily average of 33 <\/span>litres per head, which is above the international average. We have 30,000 <\/span>sales outlets, 25 distribution centres in Saudi Arabia and five in the Gulf, <\/span>a branch in Jordan and another in Yemen, and we have plans for Lebanon and Syria. Two-and-a-half thousand people work here [plus another thousand at the farm in which Danone is not a partner]. One-quarter of the staff are <\/span>Indian and one-quarter Saudi. Employing Saudis has been a challenge: it\u00b9s <\/span>hard to find nationals to do manual jobs, but we make an effort to find them <\/span>in poor regions such as the south and the east.\u00b2<\/span><\/p>\n

A plume of steam drifts from a wooden hut where water is being pumped from underground at a temperature of 70C. Originally it was drawn from a depth of 200m, but now it has to come from 2,000m below ground. By way of justification, Mansour says: \u00b3We used to grow our forage here, but we\u00b9ve <\/span>moved to fields 200 kilometres away so as not to exhaust the water table. We <\/span>also have a water recycling policy.\u00b2 And he assures me that animal husbandry only uses 3-4% of the country\u00b9s water supply, whereas arable cultivation consumes more than 80%.<\/span><\/p>\n

Attaining self-sufficiency<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Few people are aware that Saudi Arabia transformed itself in the 1980s into <\/span>a significant wheat producer. The government guaranteed farmers a purchase <\/span>price higher than the world market price and the country became <\/span>self-sufficient in 1984. The area under arable cultivation rose from 67,000 <\/span>hectares in 1980 to 907,000 in 1992 and yields improved from 2.12 tonnes per <\/span>hectare in 1980 to 4.7 by 1988 and then 5.19 in 2005. (In comparison, the <\/span>average yield in France is 6.98, in China 4.22 and in Austria 5.03.) Private <\/span>companies were set up and made hefty profits. Peak production was reached in <\/span>1993 (5.3m tonnes), enabling the country to export more than 2m tonnes. At <\/span>the time, the UN\u00b9s Food and Agriculture Organisation congratulated the <\/span>country on its performance.<\/span><\/p>\n

The desert kingdom is not all arid land and has, especially in the north and <\/span>the south, green and fertile areas, but wheat production on this scale <\/span>required tens of thousands of hectares to be reclaimed from the desert. To <\/span>understand the logic of this, you have to go back to the 1970s and the <\/span>petrol boom that came after 1973. Then, the third world dreamed of a new <\/span>international economic order and the West threatened to use food as a weapon by cutting off wheat and milk exports to states it deemed hostile. A number of governments, including ones which were not of a progressive nature, declared a desire to achieve national food security. Saudi Arabia was one of them. Official brochures from that time express that desire in language <\/span>similar to that of \u00b3socialist\u00b2 Algeria. Vast oil revenues seemed to open all <\/span>sorts of doors, including one leading to massive milk production.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b3We\u00b9ve become the main water exporter in the region,\u00b2 explained an <\/span>agricultural engineer who wanted to remain anonymous. \u00b3We\u00b9re producing <\/span>wheat, fruit and vegetables, which we sell to our neighbours and which is <\/span>using up our water resources.\u00b2 Along with his fellow professionals, he\u00b9s <\/span>been trying to draw this to the attention of the authorities. There\u00b9s been a <\/span>heated debate between advocates of food security and those who want to <\/span>conserve the country\u00b9s water supply. In the end, as far as wheat is <\/span>concerned, it was the water-conservers who won. The government decided on a progressive scaling-down of wheat production subsidies and they will be <\/span>phased out altogether between now and 2016. This year, for the first time in <\/span>25 years, Saudi Arabia will buy 300,000 tonnes of wheat on the international <\/span>market.<\/span><\/p>\n

Unlike many politicians, the Saudi deputy minister for agriculture, Dr <\/span>Abdullah al-Obeid, doesn\u00b9t mince his words. He was a member of the <\/span>delegation that negotiated his country\u00b9s membership of the World Trade <\/span>Organisation, which Saudi Arabia joined in 2005. He told me: \u00b3At the <\/span>ministry, we thought we should maintain our wheat production. We were <\/span>achieving high yields, especially in the north, of eight to 10 tonnes per <\/span>hectare, and there we have less of a problem with water. We would like to <\/span>have kept production in the north.\u00b2<\/span><\/p>\n

Turki Faisal al-Rasheed is president of Golden Grass Inc.<\/strong>, a major Saudi\u00a0agricultural company. While he was at prayer, I looked at the articles and\u00a0press releases in the company\u00b9s press book. He was an observer of the recent\u00a0Kuwaiti elections and is an advocate of a parliamentary system for his own\u00a0country. He shares al-Obeid\u00b9s reservations: \u00b3All countries have water\u00a0problems, even the US. But we have to go on growing. That allows us to help\u00a0poor rural areas and also helps us to master up-to-date agricultural\u00a0technologies, which saves water. It would have been better to link subsidies\u00a0to the use of Saudi labour.\u00b2 A number of businessmen who lost out with the\u00a0withdrawal of wheat subsidies boycotted the agricultural trade fair last\u00a0November.<\/span><\/p>\n

Food security continues to preoccupy Saudi officials. \u00b3The food crisis in\u00a0the spring of 2008 was a warning sign,\u00b2 according to al-Obeid. Saudi Arabia\u00a0is a net importer of agricultural products, especially rice, corn and soya.<\/span>
\n This fact is pushing the state to invest overseas. We\u00b9ve sent government and private-sector delegations to Turkey, Ukraine, Egypt, Sudan, Thailand, the\u00a0<\/span>Philippines, Vietnam, Ethiopia and Uzbekistan. These delegations have been <\/span>very warmly received.\u00b2 He rejects the suggestion that this is a\u00a0<\/span>neo-colonialist venture, and deplores the lurid fantasies of the\u00a0<\/span>international press: \u00b3We want to invest in agriculture abroad, but we don\u00b9t\u00a0<\/span>want to monopolise the entire output for ourselves. Quite the reverse: we\u00a0<\/span>plan to expand the total area under cultivation and guarantee that a\u00a0<\/span>proportion of the harvest will stay in the producer country.\u00b2<\/span><\/p>\n

Fears of massive investment by the Arab world in the agriculture of the <\/span>South have been front-page news in recent months. A \u00b3rush for arable land\u00b2 <\/span>was how Le Monde put it (13 December 2008). The paper published a map <\/span>produced by the NGO Grain (grain.org), which claimed that Saudi Arabia, for <\/span>example, had bought up precisely 1,610,117 hectares. \u00b3States which are <\/span>grabbing agricultural land in Africa\u00b2 were denounced by the site Afrik.com <\/span>on 12 December. \u00b3Getting their mitts on agricultural land in the South\u00b2 was <\/span>how a schoolteacher explained it to his students on his blog.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b3There\u00b9s been a lot of talk about investment in Sudan,\u00b2 al-Rasheed concedes.\u00a0He himself has written several articles about it in the local press. \u00b3Sudan\u00a0has a number of attractions: it has a huge area of cultivatable land, only\u00a020% of which is currently being used. It has water in abundance from rain\u00a0and the Nile. And it has a favourable climate.\u00b2 Even back in the 1970s Sudan\u00a0was being touted as the breadbasket of the Arab world. \u00b3And yet,\u00b2 according\u00a0to al-Rasheed, \u00b3there are numerous obstacles: in addition to the poverty of\u00a0Sudanese agriculture, its artisanal character and technical backwardness,\u00a0there is no clear system of land ownership. And the land proposed for\u00a0cultivation is in petroleum regions and so is vulnerable to future\u00a0take-over. Infrastructure in the country is rudimentary. When all of that\u00a0has been sorted out \u00ad and it\u00b9s mainly the responsibility of the authorities\u00a0in Khartoum \u00ad then we can invest. But it\u00b9s not just around the corner.\u00b2 The\u00a0other Eldorado which is often cited, Egypt, presents similar problems,\u00a0according to al-Rasheed. And Asia is simply too far away.<\/span><\/p>\n

A western presence<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Overseas private investment in agriculture is nothing new. Western nations<\/span>
\n have had a presence in their former colonies for several hundred years and<\/span>
\n the situation didn\u00b9t change very much when those colonies gained<\/span>
\n independence. The price rises in agricultural products in 2008, though<\/span>
\n short-lived, have probably increased the desire. But conception is one thing<\/span>
\n and execution another \u00ad and it is a bit rich to denounce the Gulf states for<\/span>
\n harbouring colonial ambitions towards the world\u00b9s agricultural land. All the<\/span>
\n more so, as private investors who grow rice or wheat are unlikely to keep it<\/span>
\n for their home country; they\u00b9ll want to sell it on the world market to the<\/span>
\n highest bidder.<\/span><\/p>\n

The NGO Grain has produced a list of agricultural investment projects for<\/span>
\n 2008 arranged by country. When it comes to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states,<\/span>
\n it\u00b9s nearly always a case of plans, visits and intentions rather than signed<\/span>
\n contracts. Even the agreement quoted as a done deal between the Saudi Bin<\/span>
\n Laden group and Indonesia ($4.3bn to develop half a million hectares of<\/span>
\n basmati rice, which Saudi consumers are especially fond of) seems still to<\/span>
\n be at the planning stage. And the financial crisis, added to the reduction<\/span>
\n of agricultural prices (even if only temporary), will also limit many<\/span>
\n potential investors\u00b9 appetites.<\/span><\/p>\n

With a rapidly growing population and ground water that is either running <\/span>out or becoming polluted \u00ad a detailed picture of the country\u00b9s water <\/span>resources has yet to be made \u00ad plans to rationalise the construction of new <\/span>desalination plants will not be enough to cater for the country\u00b9s future <\/span>water needs. No one is talking about hauling icebergs from the North Pole <\/span>any more, so Saudi Arabia needs to find new ways of guaranteeing its food <\/span>security.<\/span><\/p>\n

Translated by George Miller<\/span>
\n More from Alain Gresh<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Le Monde diplomatique\u00a0<\/span><\/a>
\nhttps:\/\/mondediplo.com\/2009\/03\/09foodsecurity<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

During the oil boom of the 1970s the third world dreamed of a new
\ninternational economic order and the West threatened to use food as a
\nweapon. Since then Saudi Arabia has sought to secure its food supply through its own production or investment abroad<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1567,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7853,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10\/revisions\/7853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tfrasheed.org\/e\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}