Unintended Consequences of Sugarcane Commercialisation on Food Security and Nutrition in Mafucula, Eswatini

The study sets out to examine the impacts of the sugarcane out grower scheme of EWADE on the food security, nutrition, and health of the people of Mafucula, Eswatini, using a mixed research approach that combines the survey results of the 35 participating households and the results of the interview and focus group discussions conducted with the same sample. From the quantitative results, it is evident that the food security situation in Mafucula is critical, with 66% of the participating households experiencing food shortage in the last 30 days, 69% experiencing undernutrition-related illness, and 83% citing the reduction in the amount of land available for food production as the reason behind the worsening nutritional situation in the area. Even though the majority, 60%, of the participating households are part of the scheme, the results show that the benefits are few and unevenly distributed, with the average increase in income standing at 3.09 and a standard deviation of 1.28 on a scale of 1 to 5, and 61% experiencing a reduction in the production of food crops. In addition, the results show that the impacts of the scheme are more pronounced on the women, who are more affected by the situation than the men, and the fact that the community is vulnerable to the risks associated with the sugar market, which is volatile and thus affects the stability of the food situation in the area. From the results, it is evident that the commercialization of sugarcane is associated with livelihood risks and nutritional trade-offs, and thus the assumption that market-led approaches to rural development are linear is questionable, and the study recommends a shift to more nutrition-sensitive, participatory, and more secure approaches to agricultural programming to address the trade-offs and risks associated with the commercialization of the crop.