Tropentag: Making Africa Ready to Feed Its Population in 2050

It has been a while since I attended a large conference on tropical agriculture.

Tropentag in Germany is an annual event that has been running since the start of the millennium, bringing together hundreds of mainly young researchers from all over the world. A plethora of oral presentations and posters was showered over me, ranging from somewhat business-as-usual dose-effect experiments to very novel approaches to land restoration and multiple stresses on crop production, and up to the increasing role of digital tools and AI in agricultural development in the tropics.

Honored to deliver the keynote address at Tropentag 2026, sharing insights on the critical need for localized soil fertility management across Africa.

I was invited to talk about the fertility of soils in Africa, and what would be needed to feed almost twice as many Africans in 2050 compared to 2020.

All those ‘extra’ people will live in cities and need to eat. Africa will also have the youngest population on the job market then worldwide, offering all kinds of challenges but also opportunities.

Hence, talking about declining soil fertility in Africa, expansion by farmers into areas under natural vegetation, and pastoralists in the Sahel being marginalized: it all goes against demographic realities, which point to agriculture as a major growth market in the coming decades.

A summit in Nairobi in 2024 on Integrated Soil Fertility Management in Africa led to consensus on the development of national roadmaps to improve soil health over the next 10 years.

Heads of state and other big people visit summits and pledge support and enforcement of the promises. Reality is, however, tough, largely because of a lack of (competing) resources.

Making Africa ready to feed its population in 2050 requires massive funding, by governments, international foundations, and development banks, but also by the private sector.

The Cargills, Olams, Carrefours, and the fertilizer industry such as OCP and Yara stand to gain from the growing business that is to be expected.

Without a shared view and resource availability, Africa will have to import lots of food in future. That is a no-go, given the negative trade balance that many countries already have.

Most soils on the continent are poor and declining in fertility, but this can be reversed to a considerable extent. We must calculate what the costs are and bring the money on the table.

Now.

Great to catch up with colleagues and make new connections at Tropentag 2026. Collaborative efforts are exactly what we need to drive sustainable agricultural development forward.

The limitation of conferences such as Tropentag is the fact that financiers and private sector are virtually absent.

It is exciting to see where science is taking us and very necessary to meet and share, but the change-makers are not around. Bringing them on board is urgent and needs convincing stories based on demographic realities.