NGOs, Foreign Aid and Colonialism

With the population of Africa over 1.2 billion and an increasing trend of democratisation, it is hard to understand how the factor that still most influences water rights in Africa is the legacies of colonial legislation. In this blog I will discuss how the political structures that determine water access and usage are promoting inequality for smallholder farmers. I will also take the topic of last week’s blog post and further discuss how the work of large NGOs and international aid is the modern-day equivalent of colonialism in Africa.

A report conducted by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) discussed how the system of water permits that determines Africa’s access and distribution of water is causing small scale farmers to be marginalised. The system of water permits that exists in various nations such as South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya was introduced under colonial ruling. The permits require people who want to use large amounts of water to apply to the government (Koppen and Shreiner, 2018). The permits supposedly act as a form of regulation, however the report found that the permits provide the government with greater authority and an even greater source of income, leading to the possibility for inequality and corruption.

Source: (ISR, 2016)

An image from an article that discusses the influence of colonialism on modern day Africa.

The permit system allows large scale corporations to benefit whilst the majority of farmers in Africa are left in a position of illegality without the permit. The parties that benefit from the system are large scale commercial farms, mines and transnational corporations (TNCs) with factories and production centres. The permit system promotes inequality and needs to be decolonised because these large companies are able to gain easy access to the permits, whilst the smaller farmers can’t (Mwanza, 2018).

TNCs and commercial organisations have the resources and knowledge to acquire the permits with ease and it is within the African government’s interest that these large companies gain legitimate access to water as a matter of economic interest. However, the vast number of smallholder farmers that look to use just slightly more than the standard ‘domestic usage’ are unworthy customers, with the government lacking both logistical power and intention (Koppen and Shreiner, 2018). This creates a trap as the farmers are unable to gain a permit. They are left with the choice of illegally using a national resource or severely cutting down the water usage on their farm. The permit systems result in the marginalisation of smallholder farmers by essentially banning informal irrigation and basing water infrastructure developments upon the usage of the permits. The system needs to be decolonised and updated, with respect to the majority farmer in Africa, the smallholder.

Before ending this blog post, I wanted to discuss how the effects of colonialism are so firmly integrated into African society that even the international aid forms part of this narrative. An article published by the Foundation for Economic Education in 2017 discussed whether development aid is the new form of colonialism. Development aid reached a worldwide peak of $143 billion, however many experts are now warning that it does more harm than good.

This neo-colonialism frequently results in a dismissal of local authority and indigenous knowledge. Global powers move in to instruct countries in Africa on how to develop, industrialise and democratise. Just like colonialism, these countries from the Global North are pushing their political agenda and establishing a power network over developing states (FEE, 2017).

Development aid, such as the 0.7% of the UK's GDP or the deals between China and Africa, rarely exist in a purely selfless form. British development aid has been increasingly questioned in recent years, accused of decreasing levels of philanthropy and greater growth of British “soft power” (Moore, 2015). Whilst development aid has long ago departed from true altruism, an increasing proportion of aid is just overseas investment that happens to be in poorer countries, returning a profit. The combination of knowledge, political practice and power that are changed with the arrival of foreign international aid all form part of the same conclusion. Foreign aid from the powers of the Global North and large-scale NGOs exist in a form of neo-colonialism that creates a rigid power dynamic on developing nations such as Africa.

Next week’s blog will draw together the ideas that have been looked at across the last 10 weeks and hopefully link them together. As always, thanks for reading!