Can Africa grow enough of its own food?

The famine in the Horn of Africa is highlighting an important question in food politics: Does the continent have the capacity to grow its own food for all its inhabitants?

According to Harvard University professor Robert Paalberg, it can but the farmers in Africa need help.

"Part of the problem in rural Africa is that most African farmers are physically cut off from markets. Seventy percent of all people in the countryside in Africa live more than two kilometers - that's a 30-minute walk - from the nearest paved road. So, their marketing costs are so high they don't have any incentive really to invest in more productive methods," Paarlberg says.

He also notes that US assistance to African small farmers has declined 85 percent. 

Listen to his full interview with NPR to find out what the US can do to help African farmers.