Bashir’s Sudan: From Africa’s food basket, to a Turkish garden guarded by Qatar

Mohamed Abdel-Ghafar

Sudan has known throughout its history as the food basket in the region, due to the high fertility of its lands, which allow the cultivation of vast areas of land and various crops, and instead of exploiting this for the benefit of the Sudanese people, ousted president Omar Al-Bashir handed over his country’s capabilities and resources to Turkey and Qatar in order to preserve his throne rather than the future of Sudan.

Sudan has significant capabilities as it has 175 million acres of arable land, 52 million acres of forest and 102 million heads of livestock in addition to the 400 billion cubic feet of rainfall on average every year.

Independent statistics, however, say only 20 percent of this land gets planted, despite its ability and that about 57 percent of Sudan is agricultural land.

In line of a plan to hand over the country to Ankara, in 2014, Turkey and Sudan signed a joint agricultural agreement that enables the Turkish agricultural sector to commence investments in Sudan’s fields by 2019.

The agreement included the establishment of a livestock company. TIGEM, the general directorate of agricultural enterprises of Turkey, holds 80 percent of its shares and Sudan 20 percent.

Also in 2014, Turkey rented around 780,000 square kilometers of cultivated area for 99 years from Sudan, claiming that this aims to boost the country’s agriculture.

Al-Bashir believed that his future lay in strengthening his relationship with the axis of evil in the region, represented in Qatar, Turkey and Iran, and Qatar, which had the biggest share of the Sudanese farmland.

Many Qatari companies went to obtain a portion of the agricultural goods of Sudan, most notably the Hassad Company that belongs to the Qatar Investment Authority, which was established in 2008, with the aim of investing in the agricultural and livestock sectors to provide food sources for the local Qatari requirements.

The Hassad food company operates in Qatar in the various food-related fields. In 2009, the company invested in the livestock sector in Sudan, through a large project for the product of grain, and raising cattle, with an initial capital of around $100 million.

The company has also partnered with official organs in Sudan to invest in a large tract of land whose are exceeds 270,000 acres in the Abu Hamad region in the Nile River State with a share of 75 percent. It also opened another branch in Senna with an area of 20,000 acres, to be planted with various crops.

According to statistics, Widam company, an affiliate of Hassad, contributed to providing 80% of Qatar’s meat stock.

In 2018, the Qatari company announced in a press release that it would increase its investments in the next three years by $500 million in the Sudanese food sector.