smallholder farmers

This article, published in the Global Food Security journal, argues that if small-scale farms continue to dominate in the face of the increasing wage rate in Asia, many countries in this region will lose their comparative advantage in agriculture. If machinery and land are complementary and machines are indivisible to some extent, large-scale mechanized farms become more efficient, which tends to weaken the inverse farm size-productivity relationship. »

This working paper by UNU-WIDER, aims to bring evidence to the debate around the impact of large commercial farms on neighbouring smallholders in low-income sub-Saharan Africa. The findings point to significant heterogeneity in the local economic effects of commercial farms rather than any kind of automatic spillover effects. The implication is that a more nuanced policy position is demanded with respect to promoting rural dynamism through new commercial models. In particular, the creation of suitable incentives for and regulation of outgrower schemes needs to be a priority. »

This article in the Global Food Security journal identified sustainable intentification (SI) indicators, through a systematic qualitative review of the literature with a primary focus on African smallholder farming systems. The authors assessed indicators and metrics for which there is consensus, and those that remain contested. »

This report by RAF Learning is exploring the business case for smallholder finance, in particular the role of digital approaches in making it possible to profitably serve this market at scale. New digital technologies and innovative business models are making it possible to provide credit to smallholder farmers in Africa. The report looks at where and how innovations in digital technology promise to enable financial service providers to serve smallholders at scale. »

These four reports by the KIT are analysis of four maize seed systems in Malawi, Zambia, Bihar in India and Chiapas in Mexico. The four documents describe the adoption and impact of improved maize germplasm at small scale farmer level in these four areas. The objective is to understand whether smallholder farmers have access to seed of improved maize varieties, and if so, how the seed sector supports this. »

This briefing by The Initiative For Smallholder Finance explores the causes of low uptake in digital credit for smallholders in Tanzania. Dalberg’s Design Impact Group (DIG) explores these causes to better understand how concrete product solutions to jump-start adoption of digital credit products can be developed. Digital credit products represent an important financial inclusion opportunity for smallholder farmers in Tanzania, where close to 80% of the workforce is engaged in farming. Uptake of these products by smallholder farmers, however, remains limited. »