Page 190 - Cultural Studies of Science Education

12 When Elephants Fight, It Is the Grass That Suffers 167

lamentations for loss of cultural values (p’Bitek 1966): Ngugi Wa Thiongo’s (1986)
concerns that Africa has not yet engaged in “decolonizing the mind” with respect
to language use, Batibo’s (2005) documentation of language decline and extinction,
and Beti’s (1957) insight into the disconnects between western schooling and vil-
lage life.
However, a more perpetual and insidious problem that continues to grow is that
sub-Saharan Africa has remained a “basket-case” for food. It is a continent that seems
to be unable to provide enough food for its people with cycles of famine and starvation.
However, as with other issues, problems concerning food production and distribution
are complex: choice of farming methods (e.g., large-scale, high-energy input versus
small-scale sustainable/low energy), cash crops (exportation of coffee, tea, flowers
versus local consumption of plantain, maize, and millet), changing climate with
unpredictable weather (deforestation, drought, flooding, erosion), population increases
that have exceeded improved crop production, loss of indigenous crops, the continued
over-exploitation and exportation of Africa’s natural resources and products (forest,
minerals, coastal, endangered species), the dislocation of human resources (brain
drain, refugees, genocide), and, of growing international concern, the wholesale long-
term loan of millions of hectares/acres of land by countries with monetary resources,
who want and need food for their own national consumption (e.g., middle-eastern and
Asian countries) – a dangerous form of neocolonialism. And, even when crops are
successfully grown and harvested, transportation to markets and externally deter-
mined (e.g., the mercantile trade markets of London and Chicago) prices interfere
with whether, or not, a crop year is successful. So it goes, that the marginalized
peoples of Africa who know their plight and call for ecojustice, sadly state the African
proverb that “when the elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers,” crying out that
someday the elephants should stop.
Sustainable agriculture is being revisited as a viable source of livelihood for
rural peoples as a global movement from Malawi to Thailand in the context of the
twenty-first century and seems to be offering a new and necessary movement for
the world’s rural peoples. It has been estimated that it takes 13 cal of fossil fuel to
produce 8 cal of maize on Africa’s large-scale farms whereas the individual local
farmer uses only 1 cal. And, lest the reader forget – in Africa the image of farmer
should be a woman as most males have migrated to urban areas in search of second-
ary employment. However, migration and colonization in Africa preceded the
arrival of Europeans. The history of Africa is one of human migrations most likely
beginning with the earliest hominids whose very origins were locations in Africa.
And, the Bantu peoples now claiming Malawi as their home displaced hunter/
gatherers in the sixteenth century and established their own methods of using the

natural resources bringing slash-and-burn agriculture, only sustainable because of
the low population numbers of people.
Malawi attained independence in 1964 and has depended upon an agricultural-
based economy. Realizing that education is a critical necessity for establishing
self-sufficiency it was the first sub-Saharan African country to declare free primary
education in 1990. Despite these efforts the system has not been able to fulfill its
aspirations (Chimombo 2009). Since the introduction of Free Primary Education in
1994/95 many more children have been to school and gender parity in enrollments