In line with the United States’ international strategic adjustment and Africa’s rising international status, the value of Africa in the Biden administration’s international strategy has been reaffirmed. After taking office as President of the United States, Biden chose to deliver his first multilateral speech at the African Union Summit, where he promised to strengthen cooperation with African countries to jointly address global challenges, indicating that the Biden administration would pay more attention to Africa’s role in the United States’ international strategy. The United States is the world’s largest food producer and exporter, and food is an important strategic asset in its international political games, whereas Africa is the region of the world with the greatest food security pressure. As a result, food security has become an important tool for the Biden administration to boost cooperation with Africa. In December 2022, the U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit (hereinafter referred to as the U.S.-Africa Summit) issued the Vision Statement for the U.S.-Africa Partnership, announcing the establishment of a new strategic partnership for food security. Food security has become one of the most powerful levers for the United States to carry out strategic competition at the global level, deepen its relations with Africa, and maintain U.S. hegemony. An in-depth analysis of the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa—its current state, motives, limitations, and impact—is important for understanding the United States’ overall strategic direction for Africa and how U.S. food diplomacy is implemented.

I. Issues in the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa

The Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa is based mainly on the Feed the Future (FTF) program, which leverages the comparative advantages of more than a dozen U.S. federal departments and agencies, including the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Millennium Challenge Corporation, and the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF). By setting up a rich agenda for food security cooperation, it mobilizes the active participation of numerous actors, including American companies, research institutions, universities, non-governmental organizations, and civil society organizations, to promote the overall strategic interests of the United States through a whole-of-government and whole-of-society approach.

(i) Food security cooperation is used as linkage to promote U.S.-African economic and trade exchanges, increase the influence of the United States in African agricultural production chains, and help private capital achieve sustainable profits. Using aid to promote trade has long been the U.S. government’s routine strategy for developing countries. The African Growth and Opportunity Act, which was enacted in 2000, strives to increase non-reciprocal trade and investment between the United States and sub-Saharan African countries, but it has had little practical impact on U.S.-African trade.¹ Since 2010, the volume of trade between the United States and Africa has fallen by more than 50%. The Biden administration has sought to deepen economic and trade ties with Africa through food security cooperation, and to push U.S. enterprises to enter Africa. These intentions are clearly reflected in the U.S. Strategy toward Sub-Saharan Africa, released in August 2022, which emphasizes strengthening food security cooperation with Africa, rebuilding Africa’s food system, and strengthening U.S.-Africa trade. At the 2022 U.S.-Africa Summit, Biden announced a two-way trade and investment commitment to Africa of over U.S. $15 billion, with the food and agriculture industry being one of six key areas of focus. In this context, the Biden administration has continued to promote the reform of U.S. international development financing institutions that began during the Trump administration. USAID, the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), and other institutions and companies have expanded their funding scale, added financing tools, refined their governance structures, and continuously heightened their focus on African and other developing countries, in order to promote U.S. agricultural and economic interests and enhance their own international influence.

The Biden administration has promoted cooperation between different government agencies to strengthen investment in Africa’s agricultural infrastructure. Between 2021 and the end of 2022, the DFC invested U.S. $1 billion in the agricultural and food sectors in Africa, and plans to invest another U.S. $1 billion by 2026.² Its largest investment is in the Lobito Corridor project begun in 2023, which aims to promote regional connectivity and enhance Africa’s business and food security. To this end, USAID Administrator Samantha Power, DFC CEO Scott Nathan, and other senior officials have visited Angola frequently, emphasizing the promotion of agricultural development food security assurance in Angola through the expansion of agricultural trade and investment. To promote U.S.-Africa food and agricultural trade, USAID provided U.S. $13.3 million in emergency assistance to southern Angola in 2022 and 2023, and the USDA also led the first U.S. agribusiness trade delegation to Angola for trade and investment negotiations. The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), which is part of the U.S. State Department, has increased its focus on Africa in the name of food security cooperation, and has signed investment agreements with several African countries. During Biden’s administration, the Gambia, Togo, Senegal, and Mauritania have been approved for investment by the MCC and are currently negotiating agreements. In September 2022, the MCC and the government of Malawi signed the Malawi Transport and Land Compact, announcing an investment of U.S. $350 million in Malawi to improve road conditions and land market operations, reform the land system, promote private investment, and push the marketization of food and agriculture. In December of the same year, the MCC signed a “Regional Transport Compact” with Benin and Niger. The MCC is to invest U.S. $540 million in the project to reduce the cost of transportation from the Port of Cotonou to Niamey, the capital of Niger, and thereby enhance the stability of the food supply chain. In 2023, the MCC signed agreements with Mozambique and Kenya, with an investment of U.S. $560 million, to increase agricultural productivity.

The Biden administration has also increased the amount of financing guarantees for African agribusinesses, so as to promote U.S.-Africa food and agricultural trade. In fiscal year 2022, USAID invested more than U.S. $300 million in the African food security field to support agricultural development and food security.³ At the 2022 U.S.-Africa Summit, USAID announced that it would provide U.S. $15 million to the African Development Bank to support its African Fertilizer Financing Mechanism, promote U.S. investment in African agricultural value chains, and expand the influence of U.S. agricultural trade financing in Africa. USADF has made agriculture one of the key fields for its Off-grid Energy Challenges, investing nearly U.S. $100 million since 2021.⁴ The Biden administration has accelerated the “Prosper Africa” initiative, established the position of “Prosper Africa Coordinator,” and provided support to companies such as Africa Global Schaffer and Bechtel in order to promote U.S.-Africa food and agricultural trade. Between July 2021 and August 2022 alone, the USDA supported approximately U.S. $264 million in agricultural exports to Africa through the Export Credit Guarantee Program.⁵

(ii)  Actively carrying out climate diplomacy with Africa under the cross-cutting issue of climate change-food and agriculture. Since the Biden administration took office, the position of climate change issues has risen rapidly in U.S. domestic and foreign affairs, becoming for the United States a tool for green transformation and development, maintaining national climate security, and restoring international credibility and global leadership.⁶ At the 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit, the United States announced that climate change mitigation and adaptation were its priorities in terms of food security issues, and it that would invest U.S. $10 billion over five years. The Biden administration’s new strategy for Africa is thus full of rhetoric about “ecosystem protection” and “responding to climate change.”

The Biden administration has proposed a number of climate and agriculture initiatives to strengthen support for agricultural system transformation in African countries. At the 26th UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in 2021, Biden announced the President’s Emergency Plan for Adaptation and Resilience (PREPARE), which pledges to support adaptation to climate change by more than 500 million people in developing countries by 2030.⁷ The United States and the United Arab Emirates proposed the Agriculture Innovation Mission for Climate (AIMC), announcing that U.S. $1 billion of investment in climate-smart agriculture and food system innovation would be mobilized within five years. Some 55 African countries were subsequently mobilized by the United States to support the initiative. At the 27th UN Climate Change Conference (COP27) in 2022, the United States announced that it would provide U.S. $150 million in climate adaptation funding to Africa, including an additional U.S. $25 million in contributions to the African Union’s flagship project, the Africa Adaptation Initiative (AAI), and launch the AAI Food Security Accelerator to promote private sector investment in climate-resilient food systems in Africa. In 2023, the United States launched the Adapting Nutritious Crops Initiative (ANCI) and the Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils (VACS) program. It held an agricultural innovation and climate summit jointly with the African Union, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the private sector, and research institutions to encourage U.S. companies to invest in indigenous African crops and “orphan” crops that are adapted to climate change, and provided U.S. $100 million in initial funding for the VACS program.

The Biden administration has mobilized USAID to strengthen support for climate-smart agriculture in Africa. Since January 2021, the DFC has invested more than U.S. $438 million in climate-related agricultural projects in Africa.⁸ The USADF provided U.S. $2.4 million in 2021 for work with the MCC to build climate-resilient agriculture in Niger. At the G7 Summit in June 2022, the Biden administration pledged to provide, in cooperation with Congress, U.S. $120 million to multilateral institutions in Africa to support the African Emergency Food Production Facility, African Risk Capacity, and the Africa Disaster Risk Financing Program, to help African countries strengthen their food systems’ resilience to climate change. To this end, USAID also launched the Climate Action Infrastructure Facility (CAIF), which is to mobilize U.S. $100 million in private investment to finance climate solutions. At the U.S.-Africa Summit, the Scientific Exchanges Program in West Africa was launched to provide training to researchers in the West African region on climate-smart agriculture and pest risk management. The Biden administration is also providing U.S. $155 million to the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program to invest in small farmers in developing countries, including 33 countries in Africa, to develop climate-smart food systems.

(iii) Increasing aid and actively engaging in food diplomacy. As the negative impacts on Africa’s food security of the Ukrainian crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, and regional conflicts became increasingly apparent, the United States has continuously increased its support for food aid in Africa, vigorously conducted food diplomacy, and actively responded to Africa’s food security concerns. At the G7 Summit in June 2022, in order to bolster its position in the Global Food Security Alliance, the United States announced that it would provide U.S. $2.76 billion in humanitarian and economic assistance to the world, of which U.S. $1.64 billion would be used in the agricultural and food sectors of over 30 African countries. Biden announced that eight African countries—the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia—would be included in the FTF. In September of the same year, at the 77th session of the UN General Assembly, Biden announced that more than U.S. $2.9 billion in new aid would be provided through the FTF for resolving global food security issues, with Africa being the most important recipient region.

At the U.S.-Africa Summit, in order to promote the United States’ Africa strategy, the Biden administration further increased its assistance to Africa, announcing that U.S. $2.5 billion of the U.S. $2.76 billion proposed at the G7 summit would be used as additional emergency food security assistance for Africa. In March 2023, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other senior officials visited Africa one after another, and it was announced that an additional U.S. $770 million in food security assistance would be provided to Ethiopia, South Sudan, the Sahel region, and other African countries and regions. By the end of 2023, more than half of the U.S. $17.2 billion in food security assistance provided by the Biden administration to the world had gone to Africa.⁹ The Biden administration has also increased support for food security assistance personnel in Africa. By the end of 2023, the United States had sent more than 700 U.S. Peace Corps volunteers to 20 sub-Saharan African countries to engage in food security work.

(iv)  Using food security cooperation as the impetus to advance the “democratization” of Africa. Using Western values and governance models to transform African countries has always been an important part of U.S. policy towards Africa, and it is an important direction of the Biden administration’s international strategy as well. The Biden administration’s National Security Strategy states that the United States “will also press partners about human rights, corruption, and authoritarian behavior,” deepen cooperation with African countries that have made progress in “democratic governance,” and use sanctions and other means to curb democratic backsliding in Africa.¹⁰ The Biden administration’s U.S. Strategy for Sub-Saharan Africa places the resolution of Africa’s food security problems under the number one strategic goal of “fostering openness and open societies.” U.S. Global Food Security Strategy (2022-2026) clearly calls for incorporating food security efforts into peacebuilding and democratic governance. In the context of Biden’s active promotion of its strategy for competition with other powers, promoting Western-style democracy in Africa appears to be particularly important. The United States hopes to compete with other powers for influence in Africa by building a so-called “global alliance of democratic nations.”

The Biden administration has invested billions of dollars in food and agricultural aid to Africa, but with strings attached. Many food aid and assistance projects of the U.S. development agencies USAID, MCC, and DFC are conditioned on African countries carrying out “democratic reforms.” It is “values-driven” cooperation, and the terms of some agreements even violate the domestic laws of recipient countries. In actual operation, the United States provides food security assistance to Africa on one hand while promoting various “democratization initiatives” on the other. The Biden administration has successively proposed the African Democratic and Political Transitions (ADAPT) initiative, the Presidential Initiative for Democratic Renewal, and the initiative to Transform Digital Spaces to Reflect Feminist Democratic Principles, investing nearly U.S. $600 million to rope African countries into participating in “democracy summits” and to support a “democratic politics” transformation in Africa. In the Sahel region, Guinea is both a recipient of food aid from the Biden administration and an ADAPT initiative recipient country.

II.  Strategic goals of the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa

Promoting U.S. national interests is the fundamental motivation of the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa. The Global Food Security Act enacted by the U.S. in 2016 clearly states that U.S. global food security policy must be consistent with the broader strategic and investment goals of the United States in trade, economic growth, international security, science and technology, agricultural research, and expansion, and must clearly support the national security and economic interests of the United States in recipient countries. ¹¹ The Biden administration’s strengthening of food security cooperation with Africa has multiple goals in terms of addressing global challenges.

(i) Using food as a tool for strategic competition with major powers, and for competing with China for influence in Africa. Against the backdrop of profound changes in the international balance of power, the United States not only sees Africa as an important geopolitical player, but also as a competitive arena for maintaining its global leadership position and engaging in strategic games with other powers. As stated in U.S. Strategy toward Sub-Saharan Africa, Africa is a major voting bloc in global governance institutions, a key source of mineral resources in high-tech supply chain competition, and the continent with the youngest population and the greatest digitalization potential.¹² Therefore, the Biden administration’s great power competition in Africa is derived from the same source as his predecessor Trump’s policy towards Africa, and there has been an increase in both depth and breadth. The United States held the second U.S.-Africa summit after an eight-year hiatus, and although there was the practical consideration of expanding business interests in Africa, it was nonetheless based mainly on the strategic need to contain China’s influence in Africa.¹³ Food security is a shortcoming in the governance of African countries and a key area of cooperation between major powers and Africa. Since the first China-Africa Cooperation Forum, China-Africa agricultural cooperation has continued to expand in a comprehensive, multi-faceted, and in-depth direction, from the “Eight Major Actions” to the “Nine Programs.” As a core issue for the Global Development Initiative, China-Africa food security cooperation has become part of building a China-Africa community of common destiny in the new era, achieving remarkable results.¹⁴ In the U.S. strategy of sparing no effort to suppress China, food security cooperation has become an important means for the Biden administration to compete with China in Africa.

For the United States, as the world’s most powerful agricultural country, food is a powerful resource for carrying out strategic competition with China in Africa. For this reason, food security became one of the themes of the second U.S.-Africa summit. In fact, the many U.S. food security programs in Africa, whether it is in their implementing agencies, implementation conditions, or country selection, are all aimed at expanding U.S. interests in Africa, squeezing China’s diplomatic space in Africa, and supporting its competition with China on a global scale, so as to nullify Africa’s important role in China’s international strategy.¹⁵ In the Lobito Corridor project vigorously promoted by the Biden administration, Angola, Zambia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo are all major partners of China in Africa. In 2023, there were 19 visits to Africa by senior U.S. officials, including Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of State Blinken, UN Representative Linda Thomas-Greenfield, First Lady Jill Biden, and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. On one hand, they strove to create a positive image for the United States in Africa by promising to increase food aid. On the other, they smeared and drove wedges in China-Africa relations by hyping issues such as the “authoritarian dictatorship theory,” “China debt trap theory,” and “China’s hoarding of food and fuel.” This has fully exposed the United States’ strategic purpose of suppressing China’s influence in Africa.

(ii) Using food security cooperation as a lever to weaken Russia’s influence in Africa. Using food security cooperation to win over Africa and reinforce the international isolation of Russia by Western countries. After the outbreak of the Ukraine crisis in 2022, the U.S.-Russia geopolitical game swung into full gear. Western countries imposed comprehensive sanctions on Russia, including banning the importing of Russian food, fertilizer, energy, and other materials related to food and agriculture, leading to the obstruction of Russian food and agricultural exports. In this context, Russia has shifted its agricultural exports to “friendly countries,” and food has become a strategic tool for Russia to break out of the diplomatic bind of Western sanctions and maintain stable relations with African and other non-Western countries.¹⁶ As an important part of the “Global South,” Africa is influencing the effectiveness of the U.S. strategy of sanctions and isolation against Russia. Russia has been the source of food imports for many African countries, and Africa had depended on Russia for 30% of its food supply, but the protracted Ukrainian crisis has had a significant impact on Africa’s food security.¹⁷ Against this background, food is a powerful tool that can influence the foreign policies of African countries with severe food shortages.

The United States and its Western allies have launched a narrative competition against Russia at multilateral diplomatic venues such as the UN General Assembly, the UN Security Council, the G20, and the G7, blaming the deterioration of Africa’s food security situation on Russia’s destruction of Ukraine’s agricultural production and exports, its withdrawal from the Black Sea Grain Initiative, and other acts of food weaponization.¹⁸ At the same time, the United States has repeatedly announced at the UN, the G7, and the U.S.-Africa Summit that it would increase its food security assistance to Africa, shaping an international image for itself as a helper of Africa’s food security needs. Through aid, the Biden administration has won the support of African countries for its position on Ukraine. In three votes on condemning Russia at the UN General Assembly in March and October 2022, and March 2023, the number of African countries voting in favor was 37, 43, and 39, respectively.¹⁹

(iii)  Strengthening control over the supply chains of African mineral resources in the name of food security cooperation. The core of the Biden administration’s economic strategy has been the comprehensive revitalization of U.S. industrial ecosystems and technological innovation capabilities through the vigorous mobilization of state power tools. An important part of that has been to enhance the security and resilience of the supply chains of key mineral resources such as rare metals.²⁰ To this end, as soon as the Biden administration took office, it undertook an assessment of U.S. supply chain resilience in key mineral areas and released the report Building Resilient Supply Chains, Revitalizing American Manufacturing and Fostering Broad-Based Growth: A 100-Day Assessment Pursuant to Executive Order 14017, which concluded that the United States faced risks such as the weak resilience of the supply chains of key minerals. With its abundant reserves of many different mineral resources, Africa has naturally become a region of focus for the Biden administration.

The U.S. Global Food Security Strategy (2022-2026) proposes to help African countries improve their natural resource management capabilities, and makes cooperation on critical minerals a key component of U.S.-Africa food security cooperation.²¹ At the U.S.-Africa summits, the U.S. side uses the summit platform to make extensive contact with African leaders, and employs issue linkage and other means to cleverly embed issues such as strategic mineral resources, production chains, supply chains, and security partnerships in the common interests of the United States and Africa.²² Countries rich in mineral resources, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola, Zambia, and Mozambique, are naturally also key countries for the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa. At the end of 2023, the United States signed a number of memorandums of understanding with Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Zambia, in the name of improving food security and the agricultural value chains in the region, to invest more than U.S. $1.5 billion in building the Lobito Corridor. However, the United States’ real purpose is to build a railway to transport the mineral resources of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia to the Atlantic seaport of Lobito in Angola, which will strengthen the United States’ control over Africa’s mineral resources.²³ In fact, this is just one part of the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP) implemented by the United States in Africa. In September 2023, under the MSP, the Biden administration approved U.S. $150 million in aid from the DFC for a graphite mining project in Mozambique, one of the countries newly included in the FTF program by the Biden administration.

(iv) Developing African markets for its own food exports. The United States produces about one-fifth of the world’s food each year and is the world’s largest food exporter. As a consequence, developing overseas markets for American food has always been an important part of the United States’ global food strategy. Africa is an important overseas food market for the United States. U.S. Global Food Security Strategy (2022-2026) clarifies how the United States benefits economically from food security cooperation with Africa, namely, enhancing the investment capacity of U.S. enterprises in African agriculture and food systems through the FTF helps expand the openness of African countries to U.S. food and agricultural enterprises, increasing foreign demand for U.S. products. The Biden administration’s National Security Strategy clearly states that it will cooperate with African governments to foster the business environment, redouble efforts to resolve food security issues through private sector investment, and create new opportunities for American enterprises.²⁴ Toward that end, the United States and Africa jointly developed a food security cooperation plan in 2023, the focus of which is on building diversified and resilient food systems, increasing investment in agriculture-related infrastructure, strengthening policy and regulatory reforms, and expanding the opening of African agricultural product markets.

Specifically, the Biden administration has two paths for opening up African food markets. One is to use emergency food assistance and capacity building to drive U.S. food exports to Africa. In 2022, the United States launched the Food Safety for Food Security (FS4FS) project in Africa, with the USDA and USAID investing a combined U.S. $15 million to improve food safety-related capacity building in Africa on relevant sanitary and phytosanitary policies and regulatory management. In fact, this is an initiative by the United States to push Africa to further open domestic agricultural markets. Russia is the source of most of Africa’s wheat imports. In 2021, Africa’s wheat imports from Russia had a value of U.S. $5.51 billion, accounting for about 35.2% of Africa’s global wheat imports.²⁵ The sanctions on Russian agricultural products are an opportunity for the United States to seize the African market. One of the aims of the Biden administration’s continued increase in food security cooperation with Africa is to increase the market share of U.S. agricultural products in Africa. In 2021-2022, the value of U.S. agricultural trade with Africa increased by 15.8%.²⁶ The FTF’s past experience shows that the United States can increase its foreign food trade and investment by engaging in various kinds of food security cooperation with the world’s poorest countries.

Another aim is to penetrate Africa’s agricultural seed industry in the name of agricultural biotechnology assistance. In the guise of helping Africa build climate-smart agricultural systems, the United States uses various initiatives to promote its genetically modified seeds by means of international humanitarian aid and food aid, drawing Africa into the global food and agricultural system dominated by the United States. The operational path is: Government agencies such as USAID first fund the establishment of U.S.-dominated agricultural technology research institutions in Africa, which are then promoted locally by private foundations. It thus embodies the characteristics of a public-private partnership model of government planning, university research, foundation promotion, and multinational company operations.²⁷ In 2022, the USDA-funded Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research worked with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to get climate-resilient corn varieties planted on seven million hectares of land in 13 African countries.²⁸ The main purpose of the Biden administration’s VACS program is to expand the monopoly control of U.S. food and agricultural giants in key areas of the food system, control the rules and discourse, and thereby maintain their dominant position in the global food system.

III. Constraints on the Biden administration’s food security cooperation with Africa

The long-term food security dilemma of African countries is the result of historical systemic problems interwoven with risks transmitted from the external environment. There is a series of mismatches between the Biden administration’s strategic goals for food security cooperation with Africa and the food security dilemma of African countries.

(i) U.S. priorities in food security cooperation with Africa are unlikely to alter the structural causes of food insecurity in Africa. The food security problem in Africa is affected by many factors, including the region’s natural resource disadvantages, relative poverty, rapid population growth, and social inequality. However, it is also closely related to the lack of effective governance in the agricultural sector by the relevant governments. The deeper reason is the political failure and poor governance performance caused by the mismatch between the region’s nation-state construction and its ethnic diversity. Violent conflicts between various tribes, ethnic groups, and sects are actually manifestations of political system failure in African nation-states. To date, curbing violent conflicts remains an unfulfilled task for the governance systems in African nation-states. According to a 2023 UN report, conflict is the main driver of the worsening food security crisis in Africa.²⁹ Eight of the ten African countries with the highest levels of food insecurity are facing armed conflicts, including terrorism and civil war. Those eight countries— Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Niger, and Burkina Faso—account for 73% of the severely food-insecure population in Africa.³⁰ Therefore, the root cause of the food security dilemma in African countries lies in the fact that the governance jurisdictions of most countries in the region do not match the geographic distributions of different ethnic groups. This mismatch, which leads to political governance failures, was imposed on Africa by the history of Western colonization, because the borders of sub-Saharan African countries were drawn by European colonial powers at the Berlin Conference of 1885. When African countries gained their independence in the 1960s, the different ethnic groups contained within those ill-defined borders began to fight each other. On the other hand, NATO’s bombing of Libya in 2011, which toppled the Qaddafi regime, has long been considered the cause of the unrest in North Africa and the Sahel region that continues to this day.³¹

For security cooperation with Africa, meanwhile, the Biden administration’s National Security Strategy calls for using promotion of “democratization” to resolve conflicts, terrorism, and humanitarian crises, prevent terrorist threats against the United States, and combat the expansion of Russia’s Wagner Group’s influence in Africa.³² In this context, the administration’s focus on “democratization” and “climate adaptation” in food security cooperation is unlikely to improve regional conflicts, and may even intensify existing conflicts. The history of democratization in other parts of the world shows that strong promotion of democratization on a foundation of ethnic diversity and economic backwardness is counterproductive, and it has further weakened the governance capacity of African countries. When governments lack efficient governance capacity, it is impossible to carry out effective land reform and increase financial investment in the entire agricultural system, including small farmers.³³

(ii)  There is a mismatch between U.S. strategic goals for African food security and Africa’s development need of ending hunger. U.S. political goals for food security cooperation are strong, but long-term support for addressing food insecurity in Africa is weak. The Biden administration’s biggest goal for food security cooperation is to draw African countries into choosing sides in competition with other powers, and to use Africa as a base to contain the influence of China and Russia. However, African leaders and public opinion have not forgotten the sinister history of Western colonialism in Africa. The painful experiences of the Cold War are still fresh in their memory, and they do not want to become a “playground for a new Cold War.” Africa has adopted flexible, pragmatic, non-exclusive, and balanced policies. It opposes the introduction of great power competition into Africa by the United States and the West, and refuses to “choose sides.” South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said in a joint press conference with U.S. Secretary of State Blinken that African countries are free to establish and develop relations with different countries, and they do not want to become a party to the conflict between China and the United States.³⁴ It can be seen from the voting on important resolutions of the UN General Assembly in recent years that African countries do not simply follow the West blindly and choose sides, but take their own practical considerations into account.

More importantly, the political strategy of using food security to promote Africa’s transition to “Western-style democracy” conflicts with Africa’s development and livelihood-based orientation of ending hunger. Solving food security issues requires that African countries seek their own development paths, but this runs counter to the U.S. strategic goal of “exporting democracy.” They often encounter U.S. interference, food security and other development issues are often set aside, and sanctions against Africa have become a common U.S. tactic. As of the end of 2023, the United States had imposed sanctions on nine African countries, namely Zimbabwe, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Mali, Libya, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the Central African Republic, exacerbating the food security situations in these countries.

(iii) The economic motives of U.S. food security cooperation with Africa and Africa’s pursuit of food security independence are mutually contradictory. U.S. food and agricultural interest groups exert enormous influence on U.S. global food security strategy through their internal members directly holding important government positions, or through lobbying and material transactions. The United States also uses its strong influence on international institutions to continuously promote the “Washington Consensus,” with neoliberalism at its core, in the international food and agriculture sector. The result is that the international food and agriculture market is increasingly controlled by a handful of major multinational food and agriculture giants in the United States and shows a high degree of capitalization and financialization. For African countries, this is an important external driver of long-term food security problems such as low food self-sufficiency rates, weak food system resilience, and strong dependence on international markets.³⁵

These kinds of demands to serve the interests of domestic food and agricultural giants are fundamentally in conflict with the goal of building resilient food systems in African countries. There has long been a consensus among African countries for building and improving the resilience of Africa’s food system. The New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Program (CAADP), the Malabo Declaration on Accelerated Agricultural Growth and Transformation for Shared Prosperity and Improved Livelihoods, and the [African Union] Agenda 2063 all provide top-level designs for enhancing Africa’s agricultural and food production capacity, improving food security, and transforming Africa’s food system. Building independently controllable food industry chains, supply chains, and value chains, and increasing Africa’s food system ownership have become the keys to building the resilience of Africa’s food system. The Biden administration has announced billions of dollars in food aid to Africa, but U.S. aid agencies are manifold, and projects are constantly changing and being “repackaged.” Through “public-private partnerships” and other means, a large part of African food aid funds flows back to the United States in various ways, indirectly supporting American agribusiness. For example, in April 2022, the Biden administration announced that it would withdraw U.S. $282 million from the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust to purchase U.S. food for emergency food relief in African countries. In its African food security cooperation, U.S. food and agricultural interest groups are the biggest beneficiaries. The billions of dollars in food aid to Africa from the Biden administration have increased the global market share of U.S. food and agricultural giants, and also led to the long-term dependence of African countries on U.S. food.

Conclusion

U.S. food security cooperation with Africa reflects a shift in global development strategy under the Biden administration. An important part of the Global South, Africa is also a key region in global food security governance, as well as a major focus of powers, such as China and the United States, participating in global food security governance. In view of this, the Biden administration has actively expanded the United States’ competitive advantage in the international food and agriculture sector, strengthened bilateral and multilateral interaction between the United States and Africa, and enhanced the United States’ ability to set the agenda, shape the rules, and disseminate information internationally on global food security governance.

First, it has linked to hot-button issues, formed alliances, shaped rules, and built a small circle for global food security governance that excludes China. Unlike China, which participates in global food security governance platforms that are centered on the UN and oriented towards true multilateralism,³⁶ the Biden administration has incorporated more African countries into the FTF program by closely linking it to international hot-button issues such as climate change and the Ukraine crisis. It has proposed a series of initiatives such as VACS and AIMC, joined with allies to launch the Roadmap for Global Food Security (“the Roadmap”), established international mechanisms such as the Global Food Security Alliance, and maintained control by senior U.S. officials over the position of World Food Program Executive Director, so as to expand the global influence of U.S. food security governance programs and governance concepts. At the same time, senior Biden administration officials such as Antony Blinken have continuously smeared China-Africa agricultural cooperation, China’s food security policies, and China’s foreign food aid in multilateral food diplomacy, highlighting the important contributions of the United States to global food security and hunger in Africa, while ignoring China’s huge investment in the entire field of international development.

Second, focusing on food security governance, it has launched competing development initiatives to counter China’s influence on global development governance. The Biden administration’s Africa-focused food security cooperation initiatives have competed with China’s international development policy at every turn. At the 76th session of the UN General Assembly in 2021, China proposed the Global Development Initiative (GDI) and announced the provision of U.S. $3 billion. A high-level video conference of the Group of Friends of the GDI was held in May 2022, and a High-level Dialogue on Global Development was held in June of that year. In July, the International Food Security Cooperation Initiative was proposed, and in September, a ministerial meeting of the Group of Friends of the GDI was held during the 77th session of the UN General Assembly. A high-level meeting on the achievements of GDI cooperation was held at the 78th session of the UN General Assembly in September 2023.

At the same time as China, the United States also held a series of multilateral food diplomacy events with Africa to support the Biden administration’s international development strategy and strengthen its competition with China. In September 2021, the Biden administration hosted the UN Food Systems Summit and announced that it would provide U.S. $5 billion to support overseas food systems. In May 2022, the United States and more than ten African countries held a Global Food Security Ministerial conference and released the Roadmap. In June, the United States and its G7 allies held a “Uniting for Global Food Security” conference to promote the Roadmap. In September, during the 77th session of the UN General Assembly, the United States and the African Union co-hosted the Global Food Security Summit and called on countries to adopt the Roadmap. In 2023, the United States held multiple high-level food security meetings at the 78th session of the UN General Assembly to promote initiatives such AIMC and VACS to countries including those in Africa. The Biden administration’s multilateral food diplomacy has actively shaped the United States’ moral image of paying attention to Africa and helping Africa, and has enhanced the United States’ influence in African and other developing countries.

The Biden administration has also used food security cooperation with Africa to pressure mineral-rich African countries to join the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) launched by the West, and has set up rules and standards to restrict China-Africa mineral resource cooperation and strengthen the review of mineral cooperation, interfering with the normal operations of Chinese enterprises. With the United States using food security as a tool to engage in relatively covert competition with China in key minerals and other fields in Africa, China’s supply security in key minerals in Africa faces new risks and challenges.