**8. Conclusion**

*Regional Development in Africa*

and the increase in greenhouse gas emissions as well as increased water and soil pollution. More importantly, the current agro-industrial approach has not significantly reduced the numbers of chronically hungry, which is estimated at over 850 million. Thus, what is needed is a new approach, one that the Songhai Centers have been developing and improving over the past 30 years, since the first Songhai site was established on 1 hectare of poor agricultural land in Benin. The approach must be predicated upon the holistic appreciation of the ecosystem we inhabit and take an agroecological stance that appropriately values biological and environmental capitals. This new developmental trajectory is centered around harnessing environmental capitals to produce more and better quality food with less inputs for a growing population and to do this not only for protecting, but enhancing, environmental quality and capital. This Songhai approach of regenerative agriculture promotes the real "greening" of agriculture because it is an ecosystem's approach that draws upon nature's contributions to crop and animal growth in all its multifaceted and interlinked mechanisms, including soil organic matter, soil microorganisms, rainfall, pollination, biocontrol, integrated pest management, and eco-services including water, shade, and landscape. Hence, the space-time can be filled up quicker and more efficiently if we harness life cycles of different sizes that occupy different space-times, which in essence means we must mimic the biodiverse ecosystems in nature and be able to build into our interconnected efforts the reciprocal, the symbiotic, the complementarity, and the

supplementarity that will result in the required synergies to go forward.

The resulting synergy is what will result in the enhancement of all, and this is what will make innovative technologies and sustainable development possible. The biggest technological and commercial opportunities in the future will have these as their underlying theme and raison d'etre, and they will all emanate from these efforts. Sustainable development technologies will enable the African agricultural sectors to produce more and better with less and with less adverse environmental impact. Integration of these principles and values into our technology design and development thinking will enable the creation of products and services that dramatically increase productivity, nutritional value, and quality while eliminating waste and pollution [17]. The Songhai initiative seeks to harness these principles to imagine and construct new and appropriate technological and developmental models and trajectories. It is an integrated development system that organically creates both forward and backward linkages and synergy between agriculture, industry, and services and within reach for each subset as well. Thus, Songhai develops and promotes processes that strive to harness the regenerative forces and elements in nature to develop agriculture that is multidimensional and multifunctional and also enhances the benevolent

Hence, the underlying core themes and efforts are production of sufficient food in terms of quantity and quality to promote healthy living, aging, and disease prevention, enhancement of the environment in terms of soil quality, building of sustainability and biodiversity, provision of raw materials for agro-industry, provision of feed stocks for renewable energy, and creation of employment opportuni-

The merits of such a development approach and strategy, grounded firmly in an agroecological model of sustainable agriculture, are safe, affordable, of high yield and high quality, and sustainable; at the same time, this approach also addresses problems of degraded environments and unemployment, in both rural and urban

areas, and builds a strong base for a broad and inclusive economy [19].

**7. Implementing sustainable development**

cycles and pathways within an ecosystem.

ties, especially for youth and women.

**78**

The core of the design approach is reciprocity, symbiosis, complementarity, and supplementarity, all focused on elucidating and exploiting the synergies that abound in a "designed" natural and integrated farming system based on low-cost inputs through recycling by-products, reclaiming "wastes" as resources through the deployment of new biotechnologies based on microorganisms. These synergies and amplifications have been ignored by conventional industrial agriculture and have resulted in the degradation of soil environments to such a degree that without intensive inputs of fertilizers and pesticides, agro-industry cannot deliver. Hence, an added and critical advantage of the synergistic agroecological approach to development is the creation of a probiotic environment that empowers the regenerative agents of nature. It should be clear that this agriculture *will not* be a chemical intensive and interventionist process, like conventional agriculture. Instead, it will harness fundamental biological and microbiological processes, where the full range of biological and environmental capitals is completely engaged and harnessed. This will require the (re)learning of the processes whereby our environmental capital can be harnessed, providing the impetus and undergirding the transformation of the rural economy to become productive, efficient, and remunerative. The effects of this broad-based approach should result in the creation of diverse and meaningful employment that should eventually support a reversal of the exodus from the villages to the cities and provide a pathway to a diverse, viable, and inclusive economy that will provide the strong and stable foundation for sustainable development.
