Bay
Bay's inter-riverine agriculture faces Al-Shabaab control despite hosting South West State capital Baidoa, the conflict denying productive potential.
Bay encompasses the agricultural heartland between the Jubba and Shabelle rivers where cultivation potential contrasts with the conflict that has made farming dangerous for decades. Baidoa, the regional capital and seat of the South West State, hosts government functions and humanitarian operations that insecurity perpetually threatens.
Al-Shabaab control and contested territory characterize much of Bay region, the insurgent presence preventing the agricultural development that river access could enable. The 65% of GDP and employment that agriculture provides nationally concentrates in regions like Bay that conflict prevents from realizing productive potential.
Humanitarian access challenges compound the agricultural disruption—food insecurity affecting populations that could feed themselves if security permitted. Whether counterinsurgency operations can secure Bay—or whether Al-Shabaab continues controlling territory that agricultural wealth would otherwise develop—shapes whether the region fulfills or forfeits its productive potential.