Africa has received 1.4 trillion USD in aid over the past 60 years since the wave of independence witnessed across the continent in the early 1960s. However, there is still much discussion and controversy over the effectiveness of development aid, as many African countries have not been able to escape poverty. While other aid recipients in Asia have achieved industrialization through agricultural development, Africa remains unable to replicate the success in Asia, as reflected in the continent’s unresolved food security problems.
Why is it so difficult for Africa to escape the ‘poverty trap?’ This is because development conditions are different from that of other developing regions. Naturally, given conditions that include a tropical climate, lack of water resources, barren soil as well as ethnic and religious conflicts, poor infrastructure, absence of human capital, lack of national will to develop, and outdated concepts on labor and work values, make for a very complicated and diverse reality with respect to African poverty.