Food security for sub-Saharan Africa: does water scarcity limit the options?

Future food security can be achieved only by delivering substantial increases in agricultural production, but this has important implications for water availability. Water scarcity is not currently a major issue in sub-Saharan Africa, but it would be a mistake to neglect this issue. It would be a mistake also to assume that only plans for irrigated agriculture are affected. It should be recognised that a land-use decision is also a water-use decision. A plan based on improving rain-fed agriculture through adoption of measures to make better use of rainfall brings trade-offs in that there may be less runoff to satisfy the water needs of downstream users and environmental functions. Planning for future food security requires integrated analysis of land-use and water resources issues.