Silent Violence, Agrarian Dependency The Fight For Food Sovereignty in North Africa

In recent years, six conflict-affected countries — Yemen, Syria, Sudan, South Sudan, Iraq, and Palestine — have been among those accounting for the highest number of food-insecure populations in the world.1[1] But while war remains the main trigger for complex emergencies, these insecurities have been exacerbated by an already vulnerable situation. This includes, above all, external shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a dramatic deterioration in food security in 2020 and 2021. It also includes the war in Ukraine beginning in 2022, which has had asymmetric repercussions throughout the region, putting severe pressure on countries that were heavily dependent on food imports, and whose foreign exchange reserves were depleted.

REFRAMING FOOD INSECURITY

To reframe the debate on food insecurity in Western Asia and North Africa (WANA), we must first focus on the destructive role played by ongoing conflicts, which are the main factor behind these crises. We also need to take into consideration silent violence, resulting from macroeconomic policies and structural adjustment conditionalities, particularly noting how such impositions are responsible for agrarian dependency of most Arab countries. This dependency — which can be quantified through seed imports, financial obligations, and reliance on inputs — creates conditions that exacerbate conflicts, internal shocks, and armed conflicts. The WANA region is often presented by global development analyses and international financial institutions (IFIs) as one of the most food-insecure regions. This is due to its inherent natural resource scarcity, growing populations, wars and conflicts, along with the heavy financial weight of food import dependency, as well as gaps in agricultural technology and “good governance”. In this discourse, the WANA region is often described as a homogeneous geographical area characterized by drought, infertile land, and scarce water resources.[2]

However, mainstream arguments overlook the political and historical nature of power dynamics underlying the establishment of food systems and the production of hunger in the region. In fact, the WANA region has embraced different food and agricultural paradigms, ranging from imperial and colonial interests in industrial monocropping to self-sufficiency objectives during the Cold War. Currently, this includes neoliberalism and market-driven policies. Since the early 1980s, most governments in WANA have engaged in trade liberalization, which involves a massive rolling-out of state and austerity budget measures. Since the 1970s these policies have often led to civil discontent and massive “bread riots”, along with demands for social justice,[3] leading to the more recent Arab uprisings of 2011, which emphasized again the political dimension of food.[4]

SILENT VIOLENCE AND AGRARIAN DEPENDENCY IN NORTH AFRICA

The notion of “silent violence”, as introduced by Michael Watts and utilized by Alex de Waal, refers to the non-immediate, chronic harm inflicted on populations by socio-economic, legal, and political measures that systematically deprive them of any ability to meet their basic needs.[5]5 In the agrarian context, the implementation of neoliberal economic policies in North Africa has not only failed to bring about genuine market liberalization or democratic reforms, but also led to a fundamental shift in control that has not been to the benefit of populations. In essence, food sovereignty has changed hands, shifting from centralized state elites to private and transnational corporate interests imposing control through property rights and global supply chains. This silent violence translates into chronic debt regimes, trade liberalization leading to import dependency, and the deprivation of small producers’ legal rights.

In such circumstances, violence is sustained and long-lasting, often remaining silent until acute crises erupt. Indeed, following independence, North African countries such as Algeria, Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco implemented various agrarian reforms between the 1950s and 1970s to overcome the legacy of colonialism. Algeria conducted a comprehensive “agricultural revolution” by nationalizing lands seized by settlers and redistributing them, often in the form of large state-run farms or cooperatives, with the aim of promoting access and small-scale development.[6] In Morocco, agricultural modernization focused on creating a loyal class of middle-income farmers, while the monarchy secured its power by redistributing land colonized by the French and expropriated from rural elites, thereby maintaining state control over the land system. Tunisia first nationalized vast colonized lands to support a brief experiment with peasant cooperatives, before shifting towards market-based policies.[7] Agrarian reforms in Egypt under the Nasser regime (1952–1970) redistributed agricultural land, improving security and increasing small- and medium-scale farm ownership.[8]

Ultimately, the dominant postcolonial development model in North African countries was characterized by a commitment to modernization through state capitalist and Green Revolution policies. These initiatives have involved large-scale irrigation projects, technical assistance, the promotion of mechanization, chemical inputs, and cash crop farming. Despite the initial objectives of self-sufficiency, this period often maintained large agricultural properties (under public administration or centralized cooperatives) and preserved the colonial model of exporting market-oriented crops (citrus fruits, cotton, olives, etc.). From the 1980s, under pressure from IFIs such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, North African countries began a major shift towards neoliberalism. This resulted in trade liberalization, currency devaluation, privatization, and the reduction of public and social debt. The main impact on agriculture was the withdrawal of the state from natural resource management, which led to the commodification of state-owned land and water, which increased private sector capture. This transformation was accompanied by a dismantling of state support and an erosion of previous reforms.

In Algeria, state farms were divided up and gradually transferred to agricultural investors, with state support for inputs completely eliminated following an agreement with the IMF in 1994[9] Morocco intensified privatization in 2003, transferring ownership of 90 percent of former colonized land from public companies to private investors, state officials, and security agencies. Tunisia ended state-led commercialization of products, shifting agriculture towards exports and high value-added crops, even before its 1986 structural adjustment programme.[10] Egypt eroded state farms, dismantled the Agricultural Cooperative Union, removed subsidies, and abolished ownership limits on reclaimed land; culminating in a 1992 law that ended tenancy security for leaseholders, which sparked protests.[11]

The neoliberal orientation has shifted the region’s focus away from food self-sufficiency, towards market-based food “security”, making the region dependent on global commodity markets. Algeria and Egypt have become among the world’s largest importers of wheat. At the same time, they have removed state subsidies and support for small farmers. These IMF- and WB-directed measures have resulted in the promotion of large-scale industrial agriculture. Such developments effectively reproduce colonial structures of land concentration, with a dominant export-oriented agriculture supported by international trade agreements — particularly with the European Union. Along with the prevalence of a globalized, consumerist diet, this has resulted in a dualistic agricultural sector, characterized on the one hand by subsidized, large-scale private farms, and on the other by marginalized and underdeveloped small farmers dependent on rain-fed agriculture.[12]

The expansion of capitalist agriculture has amplified the feminization of agricultural labour by creating a demand for cheap, flexible, and seasonal workers — a role women increasingly fill due to limited economic alternatives and male out-migration. This reliance on female labour occurs under highly precarious and exploitative conditions, marked by informal contracts, significantly lower wages than those paid to men, and the systematic exploitation of existing gender inequalities for profit.[13] In addition, the region is subject to unequal trade within the global system, whereby EU agreements guarantee preferential tariffs for North African products, thus maintaining wage differences and extracting surplus value for the countries of the North. This dependence has led to the degradation of natural resources, the decline of seed biodiversity, and the neglect of local ecological systems.[14]

The IFIs implemented these mechanisms through programme conditionalities and policy prescriptions associated with loans and balance of payments support. Indeed, it was the structural adjustment programmes supported by the IFIs that promo ted export orientation, fiscal consolidation, and liberalization in the form of policy packages. The debt servicing pressures experienced by North African countries since the 1980s and their dependence on structural fund support allow limited public spending choices, making it politically and fiscally difficult to maintain subsidies or protective measures — thus perpetuating a cycle in which import dependence offsets domestic deficits, while debt obligations persist.[15]

Thus, food insecurity in North African countries is not a condition inherent to the nature of these countries, nor an inherent vulnerability, but rather a chronic crisis fuelled by silent violence.

SEED SOVEREIGNTY AS COUNTER-HEGEMONIC RESISTANCE

Despite oppressive structural pressure from the dominant financial and industrial system, multiple forms of popular resistance exist across North Africa, proving that “reconquest” of local food and seed systems is possible and underway in the region.

In Tunisia, community initiatives such as women’s agricultural cooperatives are actively collecting and preserving traditional seeds.[16] By doing so, they are restoring the genetic diversity lost to commercial monoculture. Tunisian farmers maintain informal networks that ensure seed exchange[17] is possible without the encumbrance of official legal frameworks, such as the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) and other national and international commercial systems. These grassroots networks thereby offer effective protection against external shocks, such as supply chain disruptions and price volatility. These community initiatives are supported by environmental organizations[18] and research projects[19] defending local agricultural knowledge by considering agricultural inputs — particularly seeds — not as commodities but as part of a collective right to food sovereignty and social justice.

Similar initiatives are underway in Morocco[20] and Algeria,[21] where collaborative networks of farmers, associations, and researchers are actively promoting agroecology. Their work includes establishing community seed banks to preserve biodiversity and local varieties, supporting small farmers in the transition from monoculture to agroecological practices, regenerating soil, and creating environmentally responsible supply and consumption chains. These networks also foster peer-to-peer learning, and the exchange of knowledge concerning sustainable agricultural methods. In Egypt, resistance efforts employ coordinated strategies across both rural and urban areas. Indeed, female-headed farming households of rural areas such as Fayoum maintain local food circuits by perpetuating traditional practices of informal exchanges of seeds and seasonal produce.[22] Meanwhile, in urban areas such as Cairo, new forms of resistance have emerged in city suburbs such as Dar El Salam, where neighbours grow vegetables on rooftops to sell directly into the neighbourhood, or to distribute on a trust basis.[23]23 This creates short food chains based on proximity and reciprocity, which actively challenge the extractive model. Many farmers in Egypt also retain their sovereignty, mainly for non-standardized crops grown on small plots for direct household consumption, e.g. okra, jute mallow (molokhia), or onions. These crops are largely overlooked by transnational corporations and export markets, thereby minimizing external pressure for privatization.[24] A key and often invisible characteristic of this resistance is the leading role played by women, who are responsible for selecting, conserving and exchanging traditional seeds. Local varieties — local crops in Egypt and Tunisia, for example — represent cultural patrimony and are essential from a nutritional point of view, providing a necessary alternative to the homogenized inputs of industrial agriculture.

CONCLUSION

My analysis demonstrates how the ecological and food crisis in North Africa is closely linked to neoliberal policies that have systematically undermined farmers’ autonomy as well as national food sovereignty. Causing them to lose their means of production, this dependence ties farmers to royalty and compulsory purchase schemes imposed by international companies. However, through counter-hegemonic movements in the region, resistance has become possible and vital for the survival of smallholders and family farms. The development of these practices and the strengthening of these networks will require a political will to legally protect farmers’ autonomy, by reorienting governmental priorities from corporate profit towards socio-ecological justice.

This article was first published in “Weaponizing Hunger. Colonial Legacies and Stories of Resilience from West Asia and North Africa”:

Weaponizing Hunger – Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung

[1] Food Security Information Network, Global Report on Food Crises, 2022.

[2] Riachi Roland, and Giuliano Martiniello, “Manufactured Regional Crises: The Middle East and North Africa under Global Food Regimes”, Journal of Agrarian Change 23, no. 4 (2023): 792–810.

[3] John Walton and David Seddon, Free Markets & Food Riots: The Politics of Global Adjustment, Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1994. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470712962.

[4] Ray Bush, and Giuliano Martiniello, “Food Riots and Protest: Agrarian Modernizations and Structural Crises”, World Development 91 (2017): 193207. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2016.10.017.

[5] Alex de Waal, “Famine and Human Rights”, Development in Practice 1, no. 2 (1991): 77–83. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4028722 (last accessed 27 November 2025).

[6] Omar Bissaoud, “Al-Filāḥa fī al-Jazā’ir: Min al-Thawrāt alZirāʿiyya ilā al-Iṣlāḥāt al-Lībirāliyya (1963–2002)” [Agriculture in Algeria: From Agricultural Revolutions to Liberal Reforms (19632002)], Insaniyat / ʾInsāniyyāt 22 (2003): 9–38.

[7] Mohamed Elloumi, “Tunisie : agriculture le développement compromis”, In Collection des Chemins de la dignité. Tunis: Editions Nirvana, 2018.

[8] Habib Ayeb and Ray Bush, Food Insecurity and Revolution in the Middle East and North Africa: Agrarian Questions in Egypt and Tunisia, London: Anthem Press, 2019.

[9] Bissaoud, “Al-Filāḥa fī al-Jazā’ir.”

[10] Elloumi, Tunisie: agriculture. p. 42–62.

[11] Ayeb and Bush, Food Insecurity and Revolution.

[12] Saker El Nour. “Towards a Just Agricultural Transition in North Africa”, Transnational Institute, 2023. https://www.tni.org/en/article/towards-a-just-agricultural-transition-in-north-africa (last accessed 27 November 2025).

[13] Ray Bush, Poverty and Neoliberalism: Persistence and Reproduction in the Global South. London: Pluto Press, 2007.

[14] El Nour, “Towards a Just Agricultural Transition”.

[15] Mustapha Jouili and Mohamed Elloumi, “Extraversion versus développement agricole autocentré : Le cas des pays du Maghreb”, Canadian Journal of Development Studies (2022): 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1080/02255189.2022.2092459.

[16] N. Souissi, “Permaculture : de jeunes Tunisiennes s’épanouissent dans une autre forme d’agriculture”, Medfeminiswiya, 2 April 2025, https://medfeminiswiya.net/2025/04/02/permaculture-de-jeunes-tunisiennes-sepanouissent-dans-une-autre-forme-dagriculture/.[last accessed 27 November 2025].

[17] Julia Terradot, “Semences autochtones : des paysans tunisiens résistent pour préserver la biodiversité”, Inkyfada. April 5, 2023, https://inkyfada.com/fr/2023/04/05/semences-autochtones-tunisie/. [last accessed 27 November 2025].

[18] Such as Observatory of Food Sovereignty and the Environment (OSAE), the Tunisian Association of Permaculture (ATP), Shapes and Oasis Colours Association (AFCO) etc.

[19] Such as the Tunisian Arid Regions Institute, the National Gene Bank (BNG), the Tunisian National Agronomic Institute (INAT) etc.

[20] Such as the Network of Agroecological Initiatives in Morocco (RIAM)

[21] Such as Torba.

[22] Such as Fayoum Agro Organic Development Association (FAODA).

[23] Valdi Carosa, “Egypt’s Roof Top Farms Helps Generate Income and Food Security”, YouTube video, posted by CGTN Africa, 25 November 2014, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_VpXPpFYzU (last accessed 27 November 2025).

[24] Saker El Nour, “Seeds as Instrument of Domination: The Erosion of Sovereignty in Egyptian Agriculture”, Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, November 2025, https://rosaluxna.org/publications/seeds-as-instrument-of-domination-the-erosion-of-sovereignty-in-egyptian-agriculture/ (last accessed 27 November 2025).