Global

This blog adresses the new market opportunities for small-scale farmers. The author argues that the demand from urban consumers who are buying food from newly available chain stores is swelling and huge quantities of food are bought in supermarkets. While innovations in urban or vertical farms have a niche role to play, the overwhelming majority of this food will be sourced domestically from rural areas. As such, growing urban markets offer a significant new economic opportunity for farmers. »

This report tries to respond to key concerns related to addressing gender equity in coffee supply chains and to share learning on challenges and best practices. It proposes recommendation for individual companies, public-private partnerships and the coffee industry as a whole, to create a foundation for industry-wide collaboration towards a more resilient coffee supply chain through greater gender equity. Women do much of the work on smallholder coff­ee farms, however, despite their contributions they are often excluded from decision-making processes and have less access to resources. »

This book written by Jelleke de Nooy van Tol discusses how we can support and accelerate the transition to agro-ecology practices worldwide. Lessons learned from the frontrunners show that personal leadership and individual action are utmost important. De Nooy van Tol emphasizes that knowledge systems need to change, since now they are too tightly knit to industrial agriculture, and monoculture production systems. New thinking in agricultural research for development is needed to facilitate change instead of providing “objective” knowledge. »

This paper assesses which policy approaches are most effective to achieve zero hunger in the world by 2050. Three different kind of policies were analysed: policies related to influencing demand, policies targeting consumer access to food and policies targeted at influencing producer supply. The authors conclude that the effectiveness of food security policies is determined by selecting the best bundle of policy instruments for the specific context and country and that trade-offs between policy instruments should be well-understood, in order to achieve the right goals and avoid perverse outcomes. »

This working paper (PDF) from CGIAR synthesizes the most up-to-date knowledge on actions and institutions that bolster smallholder farmers’ climate resilience, drawing upon research from agricultural systems across CGIAR’s diverse portfolio. The adaptation measures are identified as taking place above the level of farmers’ practices on the field. »

The Access to Seeds Index 2016 ranks seed companies by measuring and comparing their efforts to improve access to seeds for smallholder farmers. Access to seeds is of importance for smallholders since better quality seeds have the potential to enhance their production, income and food security. The index consists of three indexes: one for major field crop seed companies, one for vegetable seed companies and one regional index for Eastern Africa. »