Across the African continent today, governments are finding that investments in the agricultural sector are uniquely effective at energizing the economy. The welfare benefits of agriculture spurred the African Union in 2003 to develop the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP)—a commitment by African governments to allocate 10 percent of national budgets to agriculture and to aim for six percent annual growth in the sector. A recent report found that in the 13 countries that signed on to the agreement, agricultural production and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita rose twice as fast as elsewhere in Africa, while rates of malnutrition fell twice as far.
