In Dallas, US, for the annual US-Africa Business Summit last month, several African emissaries made the trek down to Houston to discuss oil projects in the energy capital of the world.

Botswana had its eye on an even more valuable liquid.

After purchasing 162 live bulls and cows last year, President Mokgweetsi Masisi and his delegation took advantage of this year’s visit to Texas to take delivery of 12,000 semen vials known as straws. It’s all part of an ambitious plan to double the nation’s herd of 2.8 million cattle over the next five years, says Minister of Agriculture Fidelis Molao.

“As a people, we are agriculturalists,” Molao tells The Africa Report. “That’s the basis from which we started: Everyone knows one or two things about raising animals, cattle, small stock. We want to change the mindset of our people to not just get involved in what we call subsistence farming, just to feed themselves, but to see business out of it.”

Today Botswana exports 95% of its beef, mostly to the European Union, but production has been declining for years as outbreaks of disease and persistent drought threaten the country’s cattle culture. Still, Molao sees reason for optimism – with Texas as a trusted partner.

“We have the knowledge, we have genetics, we have nutrition,” Texas Commissioner of Agriculture Sid Miller tells The Africa Report.

The African market, in turn, is of great interest to the Lone Star state.

“Anytime you have 1.4 billion people, you’ve got opportunity,” Miller says. “They’re going to eat something from somewhere.”

Second-largest US exporter of agricultural products

Last year Texas was the second-largest US exporter of agricultural and livestock products to Africa, according to the US International Trade Administration, valued at $422m. The top three African markets for the state’s agriculture and livestock products were Nigeria, Ethiopia and Algeria.

The state is keen to further develop its relationship with the continent. Miller spoke to The Africa Report fresh from a trip to Kenya – his first-ever in nine years as commissioner – organised by the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture (NASDA) and the US Department of Agriculture’s Emerging Markets Program.

Currently deep in multi-year trade talks with the US, Kenya only imported $18m worth of agricultural products from Texas last year but is a key target market for US food producers, with NASDA delegations visiting for two years in a row. Miller came away impressed with some of the more modern producers but surprised at the number of smallholder farmers who still farm by hand and lack tractors and combines, much less access to automation and reliable data tools such as soil testing, leaf analysis and fertiliser regulations.

“They’ve got a lot of natural resources and assets,” Miller says, “but they’re so far behind with the technology.”

In the case of Botswana, Texas A&M University in College Station is helping fill in some of those gaps. Texas A&M AgriLife Research – the state’s agricultural and life sciences research agency and the nation’s largest comprehensive agriculture programme – signed a memorandum of understanding with Botswana in December 2022 as the country looks to take full advantage of the African Continental Free Trade Area by boosting its meat exports.

“We are positioning ourselves to benefit from the market that will attract trillions,” Masisi declared at the time.

Texas is ideally suited to working with countries in southern and central Africa not only because of the similar arid climate but also because of the interactions between farm animals and wildlife that can be vectors for disease, says Cliff Lamb, the director of Texas A&M AgriLife Research. The school also has MoUs with Ethiopia, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Since signing with Botswana, Texas A&M has helped put Masisi’s government in touch with V8 and J.D. Hudgins ranches just outside Houston, both known for their prized Brahman herds. Botswana’s government has been making the Texan bull semen available to its farmers for a subsidised price to help rebuild their herds and improve genetics.

“Our value proposition is grass-fed beef – no growth hormones,” Molao says.

Developing modern agricultural practices

Lamb, who grew up in Zimbabwe and South Africa, says Botswana has been importing advanced genetics developed in Texas to enhance its beef production. Now the country is working with Texas A&M on developing modern agricultural practices that come along with that, such as feeding and vaccination,

“What they want to be seen as is sort of leading the African nations in livestock genetics,” Lamb tells The Africa Report.

Gaborone is also in the process of negotiating a deal with Sexing Technologies of Navasota, a world leader in processing semen for sex selection.

Molao says sex selection technology would be helpful to improve the ratio of bulls to cows. He adds that Botswana also hopes to gain some of the know-how for itself.

“We want to hammer out a win-win partnership, where they don’t just come and invest alone,” he says. “We want the transfer of skills and knowledge.”

There are drawbacks to sexing technology, however, including reports of a slightly increased risk that an impregnated cow will fail to bring a calf to term, leading to a temporary loss of revenue for its owner. Further, the technology is a closely held trade secret, making sharing unlikely.

It’s not all one-sided. Texas also has a lot to gain from Botswana, Lamb says, notably from its experience fighting foot-and-mouth disease.

“We value the relationship with Africa, but it’s a symbiotic relationship,” Lamb says.

The country is divided into fenced-off districts to contain outbreaks, tracks its cattle from farm to plate, and is home to the world-class Botswana Vaccine Institute, which develops animal disease serums sold across Africa and the Middle East. The US by contrast is focused on keeping the disease out rather than vaccinating, so Texas is vulnerable to a virus hitching a ride on a wild animal crossing the border from Mexico and contaminating its herds.

“If foot-and-mouth came into the US, it would spread like wildfire,” he warns. “It would cripple the livestock industry in the US.”

‘Africa is a distant market’

Despite the growing collaboration, roadblocks remain.

Agriculture Commissioner Miller says some Texan farmers have yet to be convinced that Africa is worth the effort. “The African market is distant. It just costs so much to get anything there,” he says. “We have to be cautious of tariffs, and the freight can keep us out of the market. So that’s one of the main reasons we’ve never aggressively pursued it.”

Africa’s stance against genetically modified (GM) crops is another issue that Texas would need to see reversed before its exports can flourish.

Only 11 of the 54 African countries have approved the cultivation of GM crops, according to Gideon Sadikiel Mmbando of the University of Dodoma in Tanzania. Botswana, which is heavily reliant on the GMO-sceptical European Union for its exports, is not on that list.

“If they could open that up there in Africa, that’d be huge for us,” Miller says.

Lamb says Botswana is unlikely to jeopardise its access to the vast EU market. But he sees potential in the field of gene editing, a non-GMO technology that can be used to make plants and animals more adaptable to harsh climates and more resilient to the lack of water.

“I believe Botswana can be sort of a leading nation in terms of growing these agricultural products,” he says.