Knowledge Portal

This book focuses on understanding and improving relations between farmers and firms. The book presents an approach – comprising an analytical framework, a practical assessment tool and suggestions for action – that can be used to analyse, assess and facilitate the relationship between supplying farmers and their organization on the one hand and buying firms on the other. This approach is called “It takes two to trade” (abbreviated as “2-2 Trade”) because farmers and firms need each other if their relationship to perform wel. »

The paper provides an overview of the youth employment challenge in sub-Saharan Africa. It gives context on the overall economic and employment climate in the region, and takes stock of what is known — and not known — about youth employment specifically. It summarizes existing interventions to expand employment and livelihood opportunities for African youth, and identifies research that could address policy-relevant knowledge gaps. »

This working paper analyses to what extend development partners contribute to change in food and nutrition security policies in Ethiopia and Burkina Faso. The analysis of some policy-decisions shows the complexity of relations between aid and national the actors. The authors analyse how the multidimensional nature of food and nutrition security challenges is addressed in policy-making processes. The authors discovered that often FNS policies and institutional frameworks remain predominantly agricultural production-oriented. »

A new generation of coffee professionals is urgently needed. Over the last decade, organisations in various parts of the world have launched projects to increase the number of youth involved in the coffee sector. These projects provide clear insights that can be applied in many other sectors and can potentially transform the coffee production sector. This publication by Hivos summarizes 5 case studies worldwide on good practices how to involve youth in the coffee sector, and comes up with successful strategies that attracted young people back to the coffee sector. »

This article discusses the extend to which competing and conjoined interests in agricultural modernization reshape the right to food since actors, norms and practices change. This is partly due to economic globalization that has transformed the politics regarding the right to food. The authors use the concept of interlegality, which considers dynamic perspectives of plural legal orders. »

In this article method was developed for designing ‘fair’ diets (not using more than globally available arable land per capita) and for assessing the sustainability of such diets. The diets were based on the principle of ‘ecological leftovers’ for livestock production, i.e. raising livestock on pasture and by-products not suitable for or wanted by humans. The method was applied to Sweden using three different scenarios for livestock production »