Miscellaneous


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Agriculture and Social Protection in Malawi
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Social_Protection_in_MalawiThis paper reviews social protection and agriculture policies in Malawi in order to explorethe links, synergies and conflicts that lie between them. It begins with brief backgroundinformation about Malawi, in terms of its economic and welfare indicators.

Particularemphasis is placed on understanding agricultural and social protection policies within thecontext of

(a) political issues and

(b) market and livelihood development.

This is followed witha review of agricultural and social protection policies, their interactions and their impacts onlivelihoods and welfare. Specific attention is given to evolving input subsidy policies whichare of particular relevance to this review. We conclude with a discussion of lessons that canbe learned from Malawian experience with agriculture and social protection.

Before examining specific agricultural and social protection policies in terms of their evolutionand outcomes, it is important to place these in context. We focus on three particular (andinter-related) aspects of context, the political context (as this affects the policy choices thatpoliticians make), the economic context (as this affects the policy demands, resources andhence options), and the agricultural and rural livelihood context (as this affects the policydemands and policy outcomes).

A broad historical understanding is critical in understandingthese contexts, and table 1 sets out major pertinent events since 1990/91. The Economic Context With more than 55% of its rural population in poverty and 24% ultra-poor in 2004/5(National Statistical Office, 2005, and GNI per capita of around 170 US$, Malawi is oneof the poorest countries in the world, as evidenced by a range of social and economic indicators. Many people in Malawi are characterized by high levels ofvulnerability, due to the fragility of their livelihoods, susceptibility to shocks, and largenumbers of non-poor people living just above the poverty line (Devereux et al., 2006).

Social Protection for Agricultural Growth in Africa
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Various explanations have been advanced for the persistent under-performance of agriculturein many African countries, where smallholder farming is still the dominant livelihood activity and the main source of employment, food and income. Some of the oldest argumentsremain the most compelling.

African farmers face harsh agro-ecologies and erratic weather,characterised by low soil fertility, recurrent droughts and/or floods, and increasingly unpredictable weather patterns associated with climate change. Vulnerability to shocks is compounded by infrastructure deficits (roads and transport networks, telecommunications,potable water and irrigation) that keep poor communities poor and vulnerable, as testifiedby the phenomenon observed during livelihood crises of steep food price gradients fromisolated rural villages to densely settled urban centres.

African farmers have also been inadequately protected against the forces of globalisation and adverse international terms oftrade – for instance, Western farmers and markets are heavily protected in ways that African farmers and markets are not. Finally, African agriculture has been the subject of numerous experiments – strategies,policies, programmes and projects – from ‘Integrated Rural Development Programmes’(IRDPs) in the 1960s to ‘Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers’ (PRSPs) in the 1990s.

Perhaps the most significant intervention of the last half-century was agricultural liberalisation,promoted under the ‘structural adjustment’ reform umbrella during the 1980s and 1990s. Following inconclusive evidence on the impacts of these policy reform processes, the debatecontinues over whether agricultural liberalisation was a good idea badly implemented by‘refusenik’ African governments, or a bad idea doomed to fail, that was imposed on African governments against their better judgement and against the interests of their poor andvulnerable citizens, many of whom are small farmers.

This debate is relevant to our topic,since government interventions in agriculture (pre-liberalisation) were motivated by concerns to achieve household and national food security, both by supporting agricultural growth and by protecting farmers against agricultural risks and market failures.

Seasonality and High Food Prices: a Double Challenge
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}
1. Seasonal hunger is predictable, can be understood and there are tested solutions

2. What happens during seasonal hunger and what happens in famine differs only in severity – Sequencing of coping remains largely the same

3. Moreover the link between them is causal: a chain of shocks leads to the erosion of resilience of a whole community, turning the “normal” seasonal hunger into a major catastrophe.

  • Production failures
  • Reduction of off-farm employment opportunities
  • Hazards
  • Action or inaction in the corridors of power Seasonality: father of all famine
  • Famine can not be stopped unless seasonal hunger is stopped

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Building a common foundation for fighting seasonal hunger
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off} Community-based management of acutemalnutrition programs

  • Child growth promotion programs (maternal andchild nutrition, especially from pregnancy to age 3)
  • Seasonal employment programs
  • Social pensions for those unable to work

A “minimum essential package” for fighting seasonal hunger, How much would universalizing a minimum essential package cost annually?

Indicative, order-of-magnitude estimates…

– CMAM programs: £0.96 to £1.87 billion to treat world’s 19 million severely acutely malnourished children
– Child growth promotion: £3.82 to £7.44 billion for approximately 600 million preschool children living in poor countries
– Seasonal employment programs: £15 to £27 billion at 100 days/yearand £1/day wage transfer for an estimated 200 million extremely poor households, plus administrative etc. costs
– Social pensions: £6.03 to £12.21 billion at 50p/day to 30 million elderly in the poorest countries

Total cost of package: £25.81 – £48.52 billion

  • less than 0.1% of global GDP0.
  • 1% of UK GDP equals about 4p/day per person
  • less than 7% of annual military spending worldwide From Policy to Rights
  • The right to food

-Included in international covenants: International Covenant Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and Convention on the Rights of the Child

-Primary objective of covenants is to guide the incorporation of rights into national law

-Enforcement of the right to food has the effect of converting discretionary policy into legal entitlements

-India example of how legal protection of the right to food can have practical impact…
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Seasonality and Social Protection in Africa
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Scial_Protection_in_AfricaThis Working Paper draws on nearly twenty years of research in several African countries,on the inter-related themes of food insecurity, seasonality, coping strategies, famine, form a land in formal safety nets, and social protection. The paper has three objectives:

  • to document and synthesise evidence on the nature and consequences of 1seasonality across rural Africa, highlighting the similarities and convergencesacross contexts;
  • to explore the various policy interventions that have been implemented in 2 response to seasonality, with particular reference to the emerging social protectionagenda;
  • to argue that current approaches to social protection are misconceived and 3inadequate for addressing the seasonal dimensions of rural vulnerability.

2 Seasonality and ‘coping’ in four African countries

2.1 Seasonality is an under-reported food and health crisis that impoverishes and kills Africansevery year; only its severity and duration vary across households and over time. In rain-fedfarming systems, where smallholders depend on a single rainy season for most of their staple food needs, the annual ‘hungry season’ or soudure can last from a few weeks to several months, depending on the extent of food production, self-sufficiency achieved in a given year.

The rhythm of rural life in much of Africa is entirely dictated by this inflexible seasonal calendar, but the relative success or failure of this way of life is determined by the unpredictable behaviour of the weather. The mechanism is straight forward, repetitive as the calendar, and relentless. Smallholders prepare their plots while waiting for the rains to start, then they plant their seeds, then they pray that the rains will be adequate and well.

Future Agricultures in Kenya
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}By John Omiti

Future Agricultures-kenyaCross-country co-ordination issues
Commercialization – Gem Arwings Kodhek / Steve Wiggins

Social Protection – Lydia Ndirangu/ Stephen Devereux
Country co-ordination – John Omiti / John Thompson

Challenges of FAC Research – 1
Carry-over from Phase 1

– Fertiliser paper (Karuti/Atieno)

  • Lack of Country Advisory committee
  • Objections from some national members
  • Slow Disbursements of funds

– leads to slow implementation

– loss of good field assistants

Carry-over from Phase 1

– Fertiliser paper (Karuti/Atieno)

  • Lack of Country Advisory committee
  • Objections from some national members
  • Diminishing interest by some members
  • Cross-country co-ordination issues
  • Slow Disbursements of funds

– leads to slow implementation

– loss of good field assistants

Challenges of FAC Research – 2

  • Data problems Time series and Cross-sectional
  • Sharing mechanisms
  • 5. Exchange rate variations
  • £ vs. €£ vs. $
  • Slow or ineffective implementation
  • Future Research Themes
  • Kenya Vision 2030
  • High input cost Inappropriate land use practices
  • Limited application of agricultural technology and innovation
  • Weak farmer institutions
  • Poor livestock husbandry practice limited extension services
  • Over-dependence on rain-fed agriculture
  • Inadequate credit facilities
  • DfID (2008-2013)
  • New agriculture technologies
  • High value agriculture in areas of medium to high potential
  • Rural economic Risk, vulnerability and adaptation
  • Market Managing natural resources
  • Future Prospects Appear pretty good! Strong stakeholder interest Good research output coming thru! Cross-country work very promising for policy uptake/outcomes.{jcomments off}

Policy Process Theme Progress and Challenges in Year 1
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Didn’t get started until December

– Long delay in contracts (DFID contract, PP time allocation)
– Getting team together (methodology and detailed planning for MoA district study)

  • Main policy engagement: Tuesday fertiliser workshop
  • MoA study:
    – Secondary data collection started
    – Field work to begin next week
    – Draft reports by March 31st, workshops June
  • Draft review of SWAps in agriculture (Lidia)  

Vision

  • Integrating political economy, institutional and technocratic perspectives on how and why agricultural policies are made
    –Linking broad governance to agricultureStraddles Sustainable Agriculture and Governance themes of DFID Research Strategy

Role and Performance of Ministries of Agriculture and Rural Development

  • Role in 21st century
  • What they actually do and why
  • How well they do this and how to improve it
  • –Including potential for stakeholder participation in planning and evaluation

  • Phase 1: 2 districts in each of Kenya and Malawi
  • This year: 2 more districts in Kenya, 1 in Malawi
  • – Chosen by both agro-ecology and politics

  • Year 2: Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Ghan
  • – Action research component?

Relevance

  • Ministry capacity (regulator, coordinator, service provider?) fundamental to:
  • – efforts on commercialisation, technology adoption
    – CAADP objectives (10% budget target)

  • Extension debates:
    – AGRA stockist model, FIPS, NAADS
  • – Is there any future for public delivery?
    – “Mixed ecology” approach

    Relevance to DFID Research Strategy
    Little under Sust Ag, but Governance (Building Strong and Effective States) envisages research on:“… decentralisation and the role of local organisations and the private sector in delivering services. We will also examine the importance of a government’s financial management in the relationship between the state and the people. We will continue to examine the link between power, politics and the relationships between society and the state. We will ask how these shape development as well as contribute to holding the state to account to its actions.” [p33]

Growth & Social Protection
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}growth_and_social_protectionOUTPUTS  (1):   Working Paper series

WP01       Building Synergies between Social Protection and Smallholder Agricultural Policies
WP02       Agriculture and Social Protection in Malawi
WP03       Agriculture and Social Protection in Ethiopia
WP04       Agriculture and Social Protection in Ghana
WP05       Agriculture and Social Protection in Kenya
WP06       Social Protection for Agricultural Growth in Africa
WP07       Seasonality and Social Protection in Africa 

OUTPUTS  (2):   Briefing Paper series

FAC BP                    The Global Fertiliser Crisis and Africa
GSP BP01                Agriculture and Social Protection in Africa
GSP BP03                Agriculture and Social Protection in Malawi
GSP BP03                Agriculture and Social Protection in Ethiopia
GSP BP04                Agriculture and Social Protection in Ghana 

Agricultural Commercialisation
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}agricultural_commercialisationAim:

  • to examine relation of commercialisation of small farming
  • to levels of food security andother variations amongst households such as assets
  • to see how much intervention overcomes potential failures in factor & product marketsto observe early results

Method:

  • Study comparable communities of small and poor farmers subject to intervention to facilitate more commercialised production
  • Three areas of Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi
  • Observe outset of intervention, return two or one year later
  • Combination of qualitative study +  small household surveys
  • Start of studies to be staggered: 08/09 Kenya; 09/10 Ethiopia, Malawi
  • But not possible to begin in Kenya during current year Plan for 09/10 & onwards

Policy frameworks for increasing soil fertility in Africa
January 15, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}soil_fertility_in_AfricaEveryone is agreed that one of the central components of achieving an „African Green Revolution. is totackle the widespread soil fertility constraints in African agriculture. To this end, AGRA – the Alliance fora Green Revolution in Africa – has launched a major new „Soil Health. programme aimed at 4.1 millionfarmers across Africa, with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation committing $198 million to the effort www.agra-alliance.org/section/work/soils).

The Abuja declaration, following on from the African Fertilizer Summit of 2006 set the scene for major investments in boosting fertilizer supplies www.africafertilizersummit.org/Abuja) Fertilizer Declaration in English.pdf). CAADP – the Comprehensive  African Agricultural Development Programme – has been active in supporting the follow up to the summit, particularly through its work on improving markets and trade www.triomedia.co.za/work/nepad/newsletters/2008/issue212_15Feb2008.html#toc1 ).

Other initiativesabound – the Millennium Villages programme (http://www.millenniumvillages.org/), Sasakawa-Global 2000 www.saa-tokyo.org/english/sg2000/), the activities of the Association for Better Land Husbandry,among many others. All see soil fertility as central, although the suggested solutions and policy.requirements are very different..But what are the policy frameworks that really will increase soil fertility in ways that will boost production. in a sustainable fashion; where the benefits of the interventions are widely distributed, meeting broader.aims of equitable, broad-based development? Here, there is much less precision and an urgent need for a concrete debate.

For this reason, the Future Agricultures Consortium has decided to invite a wide range of participants to debate some key issues around the way forward for policy, and associated institutional arrangements.

A New Deal for Food and Agriculture: Responding to uncertainty, building resilience
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Interlocking uncertainties: new challenges for food and agriculture

The interlocking food, fuel, financial and climate crises present major challenges fordevelopment. This is particularly so in Africa – and for the poor across the world. The bottom billion is now not only resource poor, but hungry too. The shocks of recent years are unprecedented: they interact in ways that create extreme poverty traps,   increasing the vulnerability of the poor – and especially women and children.

Such shocks are felt especially acutely in so-called fragile states where governance is weak and the potential for conflict is high. Already facing extreme risks and challenging livelihoods, poor people must now deal with deep, interacting and interlocking uncertainties. Increasingly the consequence of a complex, interconnected and globalised world, extreme volatility will remain a feature of the development landscape. Coping with and proofing against such risks and uncertainties must be the core challenge of any international development endeavour.

Addressing food insecurity and hunger lies at the heart of this. MDG1 has stated our global ambitions. But the recent combination of food, fuel and finance shocks, and the long term stress of climate change, has set us back. Even approaching the targets looks like a forlorn hope. But there are solutions to these challenges; although recent events put these into new perspective, adding a new urgency to the task.

The immediate effort, particularly in Africa – but also in large parts of Asia – must be effective relief and social protection measures to avoid the already hungry becoming hungrier. The ‘silent tsunami’ of global hunger is a real phenomenon, and it has not gone away with the reversal of the food and fuel price hikes of 2008. The financial crisis adds to the burden, as remittance flows dry up and economies slow down. A major effort to ensure a basic safety net is needed to offset the negative impacts of extreme price, production and market volatility that affect the poor.

Country Reports Malawi
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Circumstances in Malawi are similar to those in Kenya: there is limited policy space. As well, there is an impending general election so after May 09 there should be more openings in Ministry of Agriculture that will want to talk about way forward.

Core team – Ephraim Chirwa, Blessings Chinsinga (Policy Processes), Andrew Dorward (GSP)

Progress

  • Advisory Group – preliminary consultations are done – key ministries still being approached, but change of PS/directors in MoAFS problematic – policy environmental sensitivity.
  • Ministry of Agriculture – most of civil society is interested in agriculture but they lack the analytical capacity to engage effectively with the Ministry. If the ministry is not interested in this group, should we continue planning? For us, the main challenge is engagement. Subsidy programme has become so political; nobody wants to talk about (not at least until May 19).
  • Theme of agricultural growth: many policy workshops in Malawi and within the region. Social protection process has stalled but has been retained on the basis that the ministry did not have active consultation. They are sitting back and wanting to restart the process but will wait until after the election. Not going to be an issue before the election.
  • Challenge MoAFS – General election in May 09. Will slow process. Official invitations will only be made after Ministry is on board as part of AG. May improve after the elections.
  • Also participated in farmer organisation study – touches on commercialisation
  • Agriculture growth and commercialisation – work in progress on seasonality – we should have a draft working paper by the end of the year.
  • We have engaged at various levels (including Andrew) for evaluation of Malawi input subsidy. Will help to inform results from first evaluation.
  • We have participated in regional and international workshops at the level of policy makers (e.g. Salzburg). Policy makers (SADC) were there and this was significant. Ministries of Ag form SADC countries also.
  • Jatorpha – marketing it as a commercial crop among smallholders. They want to do a baseline and monitor. It’s a five-year project. Sampling will look at adoption rates. Related to the Commercialisation theme, coffee etc. is not a crop for farmers. Japtropha is a different product with little experience about marketing this. We have been contracted to do the baseline but no funds mean we have not started.
  • Also participated in farmer organisation study – touches on commercialisation
  • Ag growth and commercialisation – work in progress on seasonality – we should have a draft working paper by the end of the year.
  • We have engaged at various levels (including Andrew) for evaluation of Malawi input subsidy. Will help to inform results from first evaluation.
  • We have participated in regional and international workshops at the level of policy makers (e.g. Salzburg). Policy makers (SADC) were there and this was significant. Ministries of Ag form SADC countries also.
  • Policy processes theme – problems like delay in funding changed plans. First phase we were in two districts, we propose to add a district in the north and bring all farmers together in workshop.

SEMINAR AGENDA University of Sussex Brighton, England
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}University_of_Sussex_Professor Jeremy Swift specialises in the development of pastoral economiesin Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia. His particular interests include;

  • poverty,
  • famine,
  • land tenure and
  • pastoral governance.

Pastoral policy-making has lagged far behind other policy domains mainly because pastoralism has been widely misunderstood and ignored by policy makers.

Pastoralists’ own economic and social strategies have often been considered irrational, and in need of radical change. This opening session of the seminar will look at key aspects of pastoral policy and open the debate – to be explored in detail during the rest of the seminar – about what policies might be appropriate, feasible and effective.

Intensification of Smallholder Agriculture in Ethiopia
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

The prevailing orthodoxy is to see the problem of smallholder agriculture in Ethiopia strictly as a technical and resource related problem. This view identifi es the low level of agricultural productivity as the key problem. In response, the government of Ethiopia has since the mid 1990s, implemented a high-profi le, national technologyled extension programme. But has this worked, and what are the limitations of such a strategy?

The Smallholder Intensification Programme

The Ethiopian government’s development strategy centres on ‘Agricultural Development Led Industrialization’. A ‘green revolution’-like intensifi cation of smallholder agriculture was seen as key. Policymakers assumed that signifi cant productivity growth could be easily achieved by improving farmers’ access to technologies which would narrow the yield gap. Researchers identified crop technology packages that could make a huge difference.

They indicated that maize yield, for instance, can be increased from current farmers’ yields of 1.6 tonnes/ha to 4.7 tonnes/ha, if farmers used the right type and amount of improved seed varieties, fertilizers and other recommended practices. The ‘Participatory Agricultural Demonstration Training Extension System’ (PADETES) thus aimed to attain yield improvements at a national level, based on the much touted experience of the Sasakawa Global 2000 programme.

The strategy was a technology-based, supply-driven intensifi cation which consisted of enhanced supply and promotion of improved seeds, fertilizers, onfarm demonstrations of improved farm practices and technologies,improved credit supply for the purchase of inputs and close follow up of farmers’ extension plots

The Future of Pastoralism in Ethiopia
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Pastoralism_in_EthiopiaEthiopian representatives and leading international thinkers deliberate overthe state of pastoralism, making a new analysis of potential futures Understanding of Pastor Pastoralism alismEthiopia has Africa’ Africa’s largest livestock population. Over 60% of its land area iss semi-arid lowland, dominated by the livestock economy economy.

Today Ethiopia is looking day for a new and deeper understanding of its pastoralist regions and an accurate appreciation of their environmental and socio-economic trajectories. Ethiopians from the Federal and Regional governments and from traditional institutions met at the University of Sussex, Brighton, England in December 2006 to deliberate over the future for pastoralism in Ethiopia.

They discussed past and present pastoralist policies and policy processes and set out a policy objective that calls for ‘creating sustainable livelihoods and improved living conditions and reducing vulnerability vulnerability, risk and conflict in pastoral areas.’ They proposed to achieve, this through ‘enhanced socio-economic integration, recognition of pastoralists pastoralists’voice and maximising the potential of the pastoral economy economy.’

This report is drawn from evidence given by academic scholars in the fields ofeconomics, anthropology, environmental studies and political science, together with the deliberations of the Ethiopian team. It summarises the data and presents a fresh analysis of potential futures for pastoralists. It begins by setting out thefacts and figures in section one; putting forward evidence on influential longer-term factors that affect development in pastoralist regions.

The publication then looks toward the future, envisioning some of the choices pastoralists may make over the next 20 years. The analysis uses the research evidence to consider how the key influences on pastoralism may combine to shape the future. If market potential is high and environmental productivity is good, what is the most likely direction of development? Where are the benefitslikely to accrue and what risks do people face? Conversely, if markets are, inaccessible and population outstrips production from the natural environment,what would the likely outcomes then be? This combination of science and imagination produces a new new, more detailed and more realistic understanding, of the way pastoralism works and its future in Ethiopia.

Overview – Ian Scoones and John Thompson
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

When the Future Agricultures Consortium (FAC) began, there was a different context in debates about agriculture. Policy research was being done, but not much. FAC was providing a space that was underrepresented at that time – not any longer. There are many things going on now and the policy environment is changing with more and new actors (e.g. ISTD, AGRA, CAADP, Millennium Villages, etc.) and urgent issues – food crisis, fertiliser crisis, more publications). And there are now bigger players and bigger debates around policy-focussed research. We need to continue to argue for our space at this table.

In the FAC phase II proposal, we described a broad mission: aims “to encourage dialogue and the sharing of good practice by policy makers and opinion formers in Africa on the role of agriculture in broad based growth”.

There are others that also cover similar territory (e.g. CAADP, AGRA IFPRI, etc.) – where do we fit? What do we do that’s different? How to insert FAC into more mainstream processes where we can challenge, critique, confront? What is our niche?

  • We are situated in the international scene – imbedded in particular areas conducting ‘real research’ in ‘real places’) and this speaks to broader debates and contributes to interesting insights.
  • We are a diverse partnership – multiple institutions, UK and Africa – membership – university, NGO consultants, disciplinary diversity (e.g. agriculture economists) so we don’t have a singular focus.
  • We commit ourselves to process-orientation (Policy Processes) multiple scenarios – constructing future agricultures – no definitive view about what should be but open to creating debate.
  • We are independent, flexible, etc. – values noted in external report. One of our selling points – particularly as the mainstream (right hand column).
  • We provide research that is not automatically available – we are able to challenge conventional wisdom. 

Pastoral Innovation Systems Perspectives from Ethiopia and Kenya
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Pastoral_Innovation_SystemsThe Future Agricultures Consortium (FAC) aims to encourage critical debate and policy dialogue on the future of agriculture in Africa. The Consortium is a partnership between research-based organisations in Africa and the UK, with work currently focusing on Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi.Through stakeholder-led policy dialogues on future scenarios for agriculture, informed by field research, the Consortium aims to elaborate the practical and policy challenges of establishing and sustaining pro-poor agricultural growth in Africa, with a focus onEthiopia, Kenya and Malawi.Current work focuses on four core themes:

Policy processes: what political, organisational or budgetary processes promote or hinderpathways to pro-poor, agriculture-led growth? What role should different actors, includingMinistries of Agriculture, have in this?
Growth and social protection: what are the trade-offs and complementarities betweengrowth and social protection objectives?
Agricultural commercialisation: what types of commercialisation of agriculture bothpromote growth and reduce poverty? What institutional and market arrangements arerequired?Science, technology and innovation: how can agricultural technology be made to workfor the poor? How are technology trajectories linked to processes of agrarian/livelihoodchange?

Policy Processes – Colin Poulton
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Progress and Challenges

  • Didn’t get started until December
  1. Long delay in contracts (DFID contract, PP time allocation)
  2. Getting team together (methodology and detailed planning for MOA district study)
  • Main policy engagement Tuesday Fertiliser workshop
  • MoA study

  1. Secondary data collection started
  2. Fieldwork starting next week
  3. Draft by end of Year 1
  • Draft review of SWAps in Agriculture – Lidia C

Discussion

  • What would impact of CAADP target be on Mins of Ag and RD? à will they be overwhelmed by more money?
  • How can you focus on district offices only à how do you get to the ‘mixed ecology’? – in terms of delivery we’re talking about gov’t, CSO and priv sector/traders and how they work together; alternative access to services/extension – but focus is on Mins of ARD because they haven’t moved as far as the others / National-level discussions – need to think how to engage with Mins of Finance
  • Ethiopia? – Will come in Yr 2, after finishing most of the Kenya and Malawi work
  • Need to note study by IFPRI, EEAR and others on extent of national extension delivery – very relevant to FAC study à ask more political economy, institutional and governance issues on back of this
  • Lessons from Research Into Use? – DFID realised these governance issues – role of the state, political processes, etc – were missing link in regional and national work – now working to rectify this – inform FARA, ASARECA, etc. to link up with stakeholders they’re accountable to

Agriculture, Growth and Poverty Reduction in Ethiopia: Policy
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Poverty_Reduction_in_Ethiopia“Agriculture is the mainstay of the Ethiopian Economy”. This statement has almost become acliché for development professionals in Ethiopia. Those who went to school 50 years ago,read it; and later on wrote about it. So has the present generation. The Report on the Ethiopian Economy, Volume IV (EEA/EEPRI, 2004/05:10) stated, for example:“…agriculture is the main stay of the Ethiopian economy and the most volatile sector….mainly due to its dependence on rain and the seasonal shocks that are frequently observed”.

As things stand, our children and grandchildren will be repeating this refrain for generations to come. Yet, the sector has been unable to realise its potential and contribute significantly to economic development. How can we change this? In the Ethiopian context, agriculture is proving to be the most complex sector to understand. On the one hand, it contributes the largest share to GDP, export trade and earnings, and employs 84% (PASDEP, 2006) of the population.

On the other hand, despite such socio-economic importance, the performance of the sector is very low due to many natural and man-made factors. As a result, Ethiopia is characterised by large food self-sufficiency gap atnational level and food insecurity at household level (EEA/EEPRI, 2004/05:145). Whereas in the Northern highlands, farmers struggle to make ends meet on completely degraded land, in the South and Southwestern part of the country, people live in extremepoverty in the midst of plenty – fertile land and relatively preserved environment.

Tocomplicate matters further, the country’s future is pinned on agriculture as demonstrated in a statement by the Prime Minister of Ethiopia in 2000.

Growth and Social Protection – Stephen Devereux
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Outputs

  • Working Papers Series – 7 papers based on secondary sources based on FAO / FAC work – intersection between seasonality, SP and smallholder ag, country cases (3 FAC countries + Ghana + overviews + seasonality)
  • FAC briefing papers – summarising longer working papers
  • ODI NR perspective – Malawi input subsidy team
  • Seasons of Hunger – Hunger Watch + FAC
  • All above signal new theme on seasonality, SP and smallholders – brought in Robert Chambers
  • Another book – Social Protection in Africa – Frank Ellis + Philip White – not FAC product

Discussion

A lot going on – impressive

  • Portfolio of activities – lesson on how to do things with such a strange budget profile
  • Seasonality – 20 years ago people were addressing; why did it get dropped off the agenda? How will this research put it back on the agenda and how will it be kept on? A: Reason for the conference will be to address that issue. Structural adjustment removed a whole set of buffers that smooth food pricing, etc. and ignored financial market failures (seasonal finance). Need to develop theory and get it back in undergraduate degree programmes. Bangladesh is a place where gov’t is addressing this.
  • Give list of possible research plans how will you select priorities? FAC team have own preferences – e.g., seasonality, SP and pastoral areas; 1-year cycle; etc. But some will be demand-driven. Will use time after Seasonality conference to discuss.
  • Scoping study on Climate Change Adaptation, Social Protection and Agriculture – IDS Climate Change team leading in SE Asia, soon E Africa
  • RiPPLE – Household studies in N Ethiopia – seasonal water availability and hh strategies

Policy Dialogues and Scenarios
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Kenya perspective

  1. CAADP agenda, MDG agenda, Vision 2030 all circulating around same set of issues – difficult to isolate CAADP process from other strategies/processes
  2. Philosophical differences about bottom-up processes – decision makers often disagree about how to introduce participatory processes into NR and agric policy issues
  3. Kenya federalism is a very sensitive issue – ‘majimboism’ – serious tensions between those advocating regionalism/federalism and those promoting centralism à there are constituency funds/processes to influence policy processes
  4. Sensitivities over regional processes – Northern Lands strategy still in development; minister may not wish to discuss with neighbouring countries

Malawi perspective

  1. Can’t see place for a comprehensive consultation – already many – but by focusing on topics like ‘future farmers’ or ‘farmers’ organisations’ – this would be important for bringing up voices of key constituencies
  2. Process of this nature would be important for stimulating the decentralisation process, which has almost stopped – particularly important at the moment – opportunities for organising local people around issues of service delivery à open avenues for people for engaging with local government structures
  3. Africa Regional Dept – Afrobarometer – opinion surveys could get some quick results à Blessings – results may be out end of Mar for Malawi – could be useful information
  4. CAADP – having their 4th Platform Partnership meeting in Pretoria end of March – get in touch with focal points in FAC countries – organise event on future farmers and farmers’ organisations.

DFID – Broader Trends and Initiatives in African Agriculture – Terri Sarch
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Top of Ag Advisers – Global Partnership for Agriculture and Food Security (GPAF).

Top of the agenda: Global Partnership of Agriculture and Food Security

During the food price crises – Dfid asked: “What could we do about without spending too much money” – took it to the G8, etc. so the idea was created. At the same time, the UN set up the high level task force – GPAS would be setup to deliver the Comprehensive Framework for Action.

  • The have CAADP and other African country buy in – struggled to get FAO and some Latin countries.
  1. During food price crisis senior DFID advisers were asking what do we do about it – GPAF? – developed with French, G8 Tokyo meeting endorsed
  2. High Level Task Force – Comprehensive Framework for Action
  3. HLTF agreed GPAF would be set up to initiative the CFA – launched at Madrid meeting in late Jan 09
  4. DFID Food Group now focusing on pushing ahead on GPAF
  • New DFID ‘Food Group’
  1. Temporary group set up to address food crisis in July 08 – to run to Mar 09 – inform DFID policy
  2. DFID Development Committee is due to consider how the Food Group can move forward the food security agenda
  • White Paper 4
  1. Focus of WP3 – Making Gov’t Work Better
  2. Focus of WP4 – Security – Food, Climate, Economic, Conflict
  3. Food Security – good for Food Group to set out agenda
  4. But… latest news, FS likely to be subsumed under Economic Security

CGIAR Reform and Relevance for FAC
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Wrap-up

  • All these activities should be about process – but still debate about how narrow/broad the focus should be on particular content
  • Climate change/environmental sustainability – needs to be there, but shouldn’t drive the agenda – how do changes in climate affect the way we think about innovation systems? What are the factors – environmental and other – that affect them?
  • Off the shelf technologies – not just about getting them into farmers’ hands – must address governance and policy issues – examining the social and political trajectories that technologies travel will inform these debates
  • Particular projects and their focus:
  1. a broader approach to livestock would be useful, but focus on pastoral issues makes most sense
  2. would hope this would provide a platform for interacting with CG, reg’l research orgs, NARS, NGO networks, etc.
  • Need a more elaborate process to develop broader strategy for FAC work in STI à develop fuller proposal for Consortium to review
  • Innovation systems perspective has been there for some time – big challenge of programmes like Research Into Use and CG Challenge Programmes is operationalisation and developing and sustaining ‘stakeholder innovation platforms’ – many unanswered questions à CIMMYT struggling with this too
  • Role of gov’t – Ministries of S&T struggling with developing innovation output indicators to demonstrate impacts. MSTs weak in coordination and resource mobilisation
  • Regulation key issue – PPPs – incentive structure for interaction very weak, incoherence in the system à whole governance structure needs to be examined in this area

Country Reports Ethiopia
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Ethiopia team has expanded to new thematic areas for FAC:

  1. Investing in agriculture and pastoralism and ‘future pastoralisms’ – understanding patterns of investment – rural/urban, agric/pastoral areas
  2. Climate change, environment and sustainable development – building on capacity on CC, understanding impact on Ethiopian agriculture
  3. Future farmers and pastoralists – a passion for us, coming out of original consultations with youth and children, one reason agriculture has stagnated is loss of youth – how to attract back to agriculture

Challenges

  • Phase I – FAC Ethiopia team made the best of limited policy space by continuous dialogue, non-threatening approach, and building social capital. This will continue in Phase II.
  • However, policy space is getting narrower due to a new law governing charities and societies. Will affect work across the board! Government has given all NGOs one year to wrap up programmes, must register all again in 2010 – may close many down.
  • Various working groups set up but difficult to get moving – 7 task groups to identify key issues/priorities, then bring to core group to develop common strategy – but question of incentives/expectations.
  • Untimely budget release to undertake fieldwork led to uncertainties.
  • With respect to Social Protection, the theme still has a very low profile in MoLSA – because of limited resources, urban focused, but we are trying to include this in consultations. Need to identify good institutions to maintain momentum.

Rethinking Agricultural Input Subsidies in Poor Rural Economies
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Poor_Rural_EconomiesAgricultural input subsidies were a common element in agricultural development in poor rural economies in the 1960s and 70s, including successful green revolutions. Although subsidies have continued, to a greater and lesser extent, in some countries, conventional wisdom as well as dominant donor thinking in the 80s and 90s was that subsidies had been ineffective and inefficient policy instruments in Africa, which contributed to government overspending and fiscal and macroeconomic problems.

Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in agricultural input subsidies in Africa, together with the emergence of innovative subsidy-delivery systems. These developments, together with new insights into development processes, make it necessary to revisit the conventional wisdom on subsidies.

This should include an examination of the various development opportunities and constraints facing African farmers, a review of recent experience with input subsidies, and a thorough reexamination of the role played by agricultural input subsidies in the Asian green revolution.

Country Reports Kenya
January 14, 2010 / Miscellaneous

Activities

  • National Stakeholder workshop is being held in June this year.
  • Progress on the Commercialisations and Social Protection methodology.
  • Working to raise the visibility level of FAC at the national level.
  • People are interested and knowledgeable and many places (e.g. institutions, universities) are working on agriculture.
  • FAC has good institutional members (i.e. KIPPRA, Tegemeo) that are solid. As well, FAC has links with other partners (CIAT, ICRAF, etc.)
  • The success of the Fertiliser Workshop proves commitment and interest; even the private sector attended the workshop, which is a good sign.
  • FAC Kenya produces credible material (e.g. reporting to Dfid)
  • Cross-country work is very promising.
  • Work continues to be carried over from Phase I and work on fertiliser subsidies (Gem, Colin + Karuti + Rosemary) will be finished soon
  • Setting up the advisory group proved difficult. FAC had names last year – senior fellows in Ministries which were floated with other members but it was felt there was too much government. More names from CSOs – no names are not forthcoming. Committee was never constituted, as nominations could not be decided upon.
  • FAC is looking to Tegemeo to include as partner.
  • But these are informal collections – no formal mechanism to control membership. Things are being incrementally institutionalised but we’re a network with unclear formula for non-compliance.
  • This is a critical stage for us. In Kenya, July meeting was our attempt to come up with solutions – we sought names “advisors on future agricultures” but may be too strong. “advisory” is sensitive to government.
  • FAC should think about what it needs first – advocacy, advice, authority. Accountability – it’s a loose and organise organisation (FAC) growing organically – a typical network. Think carefully FAC needs the Ministry – otherwise FAC will end up so it can’t advise etc.
  • The “advisory group” is not really advocacy but a ‘critical friend’ that comments on our work.

Discussion

  • Setting up the advisory group proved difficult. FAC had names last year – senior fellows in Ministries which were floated with other members but it was felt there was too much government. More names from CSOs – no names are not forthcoming. Committee was never constituted, as nominations could not be decided upon.
  • FAC is looking to Tegemeo to include as partner.
  • But these are informal collections – no formal mechanism to control membership. Things are being incrementally institutionalised but we’re a network with unclear formula for non-compliance.
  • This is a critical stage for us. In Kenya, July meeting was our attempt to come up with solutions – we sought names “advisors on future agricultures” but may be too strong. “advisory” is sensitive to government.
  • FAC should think about what it needs first – advocacy, advice, authority. Accountability – it’s a loose and organise organisation (FAC) growing organically – a typical network. Think carefully FAC needs the Ministry – otherwise FAC will end up so it can’t advise etc.
  • The “advisory group” is not really advocacy but a ‘critical friend’ that comments on our work.

Big farms or small farms: how to respond to the food crisis?
July 16, 2009 / Miscellaneous

Debates on the scale of farming are back on the agenda. In a number of recentarticles, Professor Paul Collier, author of ‘The Bottom Billion: Why the PoorestCountries are Failing and What Can be Done About It’, made the case (see Position 1 below) for encouraging large-scale commercial farming as way toget African farming moving. Favouring small farmers, he argues, is romantic but unhelpful

During 2008 there have been many reports of private companies in the Northand state corporations in the South reacting to the opportunity and threat ofhigher food prices by planning to acquire land in Africa, South-east Asia, Braziland Central Asia to produce food. The most startling of these announcementsis that of the Daewoo Corporation of the Republic of Korea that revealed that itwas acquiring the rights to farm no less than 1.3 million hectares of Madagascar,a position from which the company and the government have now backedaway from following a storm of local and international protest.In many cases the reports suggest that the aim is to farm the land on a largescale, rather than to contract production through existing family smallholdings.

It is now more than three years since IFPRI, Imperial College, and ODI organiseda workshop at Wye for specialists to debate the issues surrounding small farms.It looks to be time to revisit those arguments in the light of higher food prices,the arguments being made for largescalefarming and apparent intent ofcapital-rich investors.

In May 2009, the Future AgriculturesConsortium welcomed a range ofopinions in regard to this debate; thisreport by FAC member Steve Wigginssummarises the contributionsand themes emerging from thediscusisons.

Farmer First Revisited Innovation for Agricultural Research and Development
March 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}By Ian Scoones and John Thompson
March 2009

Agriculture is an urgent priority worldwide and farmers in the developing world find themselves in the front line of some of the world’s most pressing issues – climate change, globalization and food security. The problem with the agricultural research and extension which is meant to support these farmers is that it is often delivered in a linear, top-down fashion which is inappropriate to their social, physical and economic needs.

Twenty years ago, the Farmer First workshop at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, started from this premise, and launched a movement to encourage farmer participation in agricultural research and extension so as to find better solutions to farmers’ needs.Since that time methodological, institutional and policy experiments have unfolded around the world – all aimed at putting farmers first. Farmer First Revisited presents accounts of such experiments which were brought by delegates to a workshop in December 2007 and which include successes and failures and the lessons that have been learned.

Agricultural innovation now takes place less within national public-sector research organizations and more in diversified public-private systems. This book asks: how do farmers engage in these public and private systems? In the context of increasingly globalized and complex agricultural supply chains, how do farmers take part in the policy processes defining access to markets, and in agricultural research and development? Farmer First Revisited should be read by students, policy makers, agricultural scientists and social scientists aiming to bring the concerns of grassroots farmers to the fore.

‘Farmer First Revisited is a powerful testament to the impact of the Farmer First Approach. From an almost subversive critical movement that challenged the prevailing linear science-driven paradigm, Farmer First has won broad acceptance by rigorously proving its superior efficiency in making science work for the poorest and most marginal farmers.
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Innovation for Agricultural Research and Development
March 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

By Ian Scoones and John Thompson
March 2009

Agriculture is an urgent global priority and farmers find themselves in the front line of some of the world’s most pressing issues – climate change, globalization and food security.Twenty years ago, the Farmer First workshop held at the Institute of Development Studies,University of Sussex, UK, launched a movement to encourage farmer participation in agricultural research and development (R&D), responding to farmers’ needs in complex, diverse, risk-prone environments, and promoting sustainable livelihoods and agriculture. Since that time, methodological, institutional and policy experiments have unfolded around the world. Farmer First Revisited returns to the debates about farmer participation in agricultural R&D and looks to the future.

With over 60 contributions from across the world,the book presents a range of experiences that highlight the importance of going beyonda focus on the farm to the wider innovation system, including market interactions as well asthe wider institutional and policy environment. If, however, farmers are really to be put first, apolitics of demand is required in order to shape the direction of these innovation systems. This calls for a major rethinking of agricultural R&D, the boosting of the knowledge and capacities of farmers’ organizations to innovate, the strengthening of networks and alliances to support, document and share lessons on farmer led innovation, and the transformation of agricultural higher education.

Farmer First Revisited should be read by students,policy makers, development professionals, and natural and social scientists aiming to bring the concerns of grassroots farmers to the fore. Ian Scoones is a Professorial Fellow and JohnThompson is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies, UK.Book Contents Foreword by Robert Chambers.

Part I: Farmer First RevisitedChallenges to strengthening Agricultural Innovation Systems

Part II: Systems of innovationPart III: The politics of demand and organizational change

Part IV: New professionalism, Learning and change Fostering Farmer First methodological innovation.
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Establishment of Kenya National Agricultural Innovation Systems
March 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}{jcomments off}Since the last decade, many of the world’s economies have been faced with food crisis,characterised by high food prices and food shortages year after year. African countries are among the worst hit, where most of the poor people suffer from silent food problems. This is partly due to unequal distribution of the available food supplies, which breeds dual economies; one that is wellfed while the other is languishing in hunger and poverty (Reutlinger, 1977). Food security has also been threatened by heightening production costs, lower farmer prices and the international financial crisis.

This, coupled with climatic change has led to reduction in the production of some staple foodcrops such as maize in Southern Africa, a situation which would lead to deeper and more widespread food crisis (Brink, 2008). Global food crisis has led to much debate and extended discussions at the international frontiers onhow best to address it. Various approaches have been designed and implemented both at national and international levels. For instance, in 2008 the G8 member countries committed themselves to partner with Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) in efforts to reverse the decline in agricultural productivity since most of African economies are agriculture-based (Los Angeles CA,2008).

Other suggested efforts include designing and implementing a commercial agricultural alliance forAfrica which would partner with development partners in efforts aimed at attaining food security and empowering farmers (Brink, 2008). Southern Africa has developed one such platform, Food,Agricultural and National Resource Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) which uses an interactive approach in tapping new and existing innovations to address macro-economic issues.

One such innovation is the Agricultural Input Subsidy Program (AISP) in Malawi which has turned the food crisis into an opportunity for economically empowering farmers and ensuring there is sufficient food for the households (FANRPAN, 2008). This initiative has been rated as a success due to prevailing good policies in Malawi, along with the interactive nature of the programme and the adoption of value chain approach. In this context the value chain approach will be used to analyse agricultural innovation by chain players at levels from production to consumption.

Future Agricultures Consortium
February 12, 2009 / Miscellaneous

By Ian Scoones and John Thompson
12 February 2009

Our mission:

“to encourage dialogue and the sharing of good practice by policy makers and opinion formers in Africa on the role of agriculture in broad based growth”. But aren’t others doing this? CAADP (with the legitimacy of an international governmental process) and AGRA, IFPRI and others (with lots of money)…..likely to be others, So where do we fit?, What do we do that is different?

FAC niche
A diverse partnership

  • Dialogue and deliberation – opening up the debate.
  • Embedded in local settings – but linking to the wider debates
  • Independent, flexible, agile, responsive.
  • Able to challenge, critique and confront
  • Communications – linking findings to wide audiences
  • Relationship with DFID – bridging research and policy.

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Put Farmers First To Transform Agriculture
February 12, 2009 / Miscellaneous

Agriculture and food are urgent global priorities with farmers on the front line of some ofthe world’s most pressing issues. Putting farmers at the vanguard of responses to the food crisis and climate change in Africa and beyond is vital. Putting farmers at the centre of agricultural innovation and development is the subject of a new Practical Action Publishing book, Farmer First Revisited:

Innovation for Agricultural Research and Development, edited by Ian Scoones and John Thompson, foreword by Robert Chambers and launched today in Nairobi, Kenya, by Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Carlos Sere, Director General, International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). The books 150 contributors review cases of farmer-led innovation in 30 countries around the world over the past twenty years.

It aims to re-energise the debate about farmer involvement in agricultural research and development, refine the „farmer first approach. methodologies and set new challenges and goals for the immediate and long-term future. Farmer First Revisited discusses: . The methods, institutions and support systems required to transform agriculture research and development systems . How farmer first approaches can help boost production and get the right seeds and other inputs into the hands of farmers .

How farmers can lead climate adaptation responses, using local knowledge and systems to improve resilience and the capacity to change. The book is published twenty years after the original „Farmer First. book, when the idea of promoting farmer-led agricultural innovation was considered a marginal, almost subversive, issue. This was followed in 1994 with „Beyond Farmer First.. But today mainstream opportunities exist for transforming agriculture and putting farmers firmly in the driving seat of change.

In the intervening two decades, the Farmer First movement – a loose, informal network stretching across the world – has experimented with a range of participatory approaches to agricultural research and extension with farmers at the heart of the innovation process.Participatory plant breeding, for example, has involved farmers in the process of choosing and testing new crop varieties. Extension systems have equally been transformed, moving from topdown instruction towards farmer-to-farmer exchange and joint learning.

The use of new information technologies has expanded too, allowing information sharing between farmers. As a result, farmers are increasingly seen as partners in the innovation process, rather than merely recipients of national and international research and extension systems. Yet failures of conventional agriculture and associated institutional arrangements are apparent everywhere. The generation of an African Green Revolution, for example, requires a new agriculture based on partnerships, not top-down impositions and rooted in diverse knowledges rather than singular technical solution.

Wider perspectives on innovation, linking with research and markets, technology development and users are needed. Judi Wakhungu, Executive Director, African Centre for Technology Studies, Nairobi, Kenya and co-chair International Assessment of Agricultural Science, Knowledge and Technology for Development (IAASTD) argues the book shows “why we need to continue questioning conventional assumptions about agriculture, and why multiple knowledges and sources of innovation are more important than ever.”

That opportunities exist for farmers to drive this innovation are especially evident in Africa. Government commitments through the CAADP/NEPAD framework are in place; funding support is being channelled through organisations like AGRA; and policy wider commitments are being affirmed by the IAASTD, the World Banks. World Development Report on agriculture and the discussions around the Global Partnership for Agriculture. And as this new book shows, there are two decades of „farmer first. experiences to build on. Gordon Conway, Chief Scientific Adviser at the UK Department for International Development (DFID) notes: “Twenty years on and the concepts and practices of Farmer First remain powerful and compelling, and even more relevant in today’s world”.

Joachim Voss, former Director General of the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture in Colombia comments: “Farmer First has won broad acceptance by rigorously proving its superior efficiency in making science work for the poorest and most marginal farmers. It is indeed a pleasure to see how the established and dedicated practitioners, together with a new generation of committed young scientists, have built upon the original concepts and methods to create this dynamic, exciting and effective corpus of work. “

Agriculture and Food Security: Pre-Evaluation Review of DFID Policy
February 3, 2009 / Miscellaneous

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This report considers whether the DFID agriculture policy remains relevant in the light of the recent food crisis and where and why consideration might be given for changes to be made. It is not an evaluation2 and it does not suggest a new policy but aims to provide direction and identify issues and some alternative ways in which the policy might evolve, especially in its relationship with food security.

The policy focussed on the role that agricultural productivity and growth plays in poverty reduction. It did not repeat the analysis of livelihoods and food security that had been covered in earlier papers3 but complemented them by emphasising the benefits of concentrating on areas that had most growth potential.

The mechanisms through which growth reduces poverty were identified as being by increasing income directly in a sector where most poor people live; by increasing the supply, and thereby decreasing the price, of food; by providing labour intensive employment in rural areas; and through the linkages agriculture generates with other economic sectors. The policy provided support for farmers through macro level policies, more effective public spending and focussing on market opportunities, agricultural finance, new technologies, land and property rights as well as reductions of national and international market distortions.

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Agriculture and Social Protection in Ethiopia
January 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

By Stephen Devereux and Bruce Guenther
January 2009

Agriculture and social protection in Ethiopia are inextricably interconnected. Smallholder farming is the dominant livelihood activity for the majority of Ethiopians, but it is also the major source of vulnerability to poverty, food insecurity and their often fatal consequences– chronic malnutrition, premature mortality, recurrent famines. Ethiopian farmers have been the recipients of enormous volumes of food aid and other humanitarian assistance over recent decades, to such an extent that emergency relief has become institutionalised within government structures and donor agency country programmes.

The discourse surrounding the complex relationship between agriculture and social protection in Ethiopia can be approached from either perspective. From the agricultural policy perspective, the government’s unshakeable belief in the centrality of farming as the backbone and potential source of growth for the Ethiopian economy is mirrored by its almost ideological view that land is the ultimate ‘safety net’ for rural households, who should therefore be protected against losing their access to land – by being prevented from selling it.

From the social protection perspective, awareness that able-bodied farmers are the main‘beneficiaries’ of safety nets and humanitarian food aid has fuelled the government’s visceral fear of creating ‘dependency’ in rural communities, which in turn explains the predominance of public works projects as their preferred delivery mechanism for food aid, as well as recent shifts in safety net thinking towards cash transfers rather than food aid, with predictable multi-annual transfers expected to lead to ‘graduation’ within a defined time period.
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Building synergies between social protection
January 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

By Rachel Sabates Wheeler, Stephen Devereux and Bruce Guenther
January 2009

The paper explores how social protection and agricultural policies interact, creating either synergies or conflicts between them. To the extent that social protection measures help poor rural people expand their assets, use them more efficiently and adopt higher return activities,there should be strong synergies with agricultural development. Reverse synergies can also arise,if agricultural policies help farmers improve their livelihoods and reduce their vulnerability.

But conflicts can occur if policy objectives are inconsistent with each other, and these are alsoexamined in this paper. We draw on numerous examples from the across the globe, but withspecific emphasis from the African continent to highlight issues including, liquidity constraints,scale and threshold effects, timing, seasonality and policy complementarities. In conclusionwe consider lessons for how the agricultural policies and social protection instruments can bedesigned and implemented to exploit welfare and growth synergies.

After a lengthy period of relative neglect, agriculture is back on the policy agenda of many African governments and international agencies. Smallholder farming is recognised by the Commission for Africa, NEPAD and others as central to rural livelihoods and therefore indispensable to food security and poverty reduction and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Africa. At the same time, however, the multiple risks and vulnerabilities that smallholders face are increasingly well understood, and new policy frameworks are emerging that distinguish between different types and sources of risk (for example, idiosyncratic and covariant risk affecting agricultural production, markets and health) and between different response options (investment in crop or livestock protection, irrigation, market stabilisation and access, cash transfers, and so on).

Reducing risk in smallholder farming requires agricultural development policies, and policies that create a conducive enabling environment for agriculture, while managing risk in smallholder farming requires social protection policies that can also contribute to reducing risk. The paper analyses how social protection and agricultural policies interact, creating either synergies or conflicts between them.

We explore both current and potential synergies and conflicts between ‘welfare-promoting’ and ‘growth-promoting’ forms of social protection and agricultural development. To the extent that social protection measures help poor rural people expand their assets, use them more efficiently and adopt higher return activities, there should be strong synergies with agricultural development. Reverse synergies can also arise, if agricultural policies help farmers improve their livelihoods and reduce their vulnerability. But conflicts can occur if policy objectives are inconsistent with each other, and these are also examined in this paper.
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Social Protection Series Poverty, Livelihoods and Vulnerability in Northern Ghana
January 1, 2009 / Miscellaneous

By Ramatu Al-Hassan and Colin Poulton
January 2009

Ghana was one of the first countries in Africa to embark on structural adjustment reforms. 25 years on, its continuing commitment to reform for national economic development has yielded impressive gains in growth and poverty reduction. Poverty in the country is measured through periodic.

Ghana Living Standards Surveys (GLSS). In 1991/92 GLSS3 found that 51.7% of the population were living below the national poverty line. By 1998/99 (GLSS4) this had fallen to 39.5% and by 2005/06 (GLSS5) it had fallen to 28.5% (Ghana Statistical Service2007). In absolute terms the number of poor people in Ghana has fallen from 7.9 million in 1991/92 to 6.2 million in 2005/06. At current growth rates, Ghana should achieve MDG1before 2010. However, the fall in poverty has not been experienced equally around the country.

GLSS5 figures show poverty headcount rates in the five southern regions of the country of between12% (Greater Accra) and 20% (Ashanti, Central, Eastern, Western). These regions have all seen dramatic falls in poverty since 1991/92 due to urban growth, minerals extraction and,in the recent survey period, a boom in the cocoa sector in response to higher world prices and domestic market reforms and production support. The “transitional” regions, Brong Ahafo and Volta, have also witnessed impressive falls in poverty to around 30% in 2005/06. However, poverty in the three northern regions – Northern, Upper East and Upper West –remains stubbornly high at 52-88%.

In 2005/06 the three northern regions accounted for just under 22% of the population, but 45% of the headcount poor, 57% of the headcount extreme poor and 80% of extreme poverty severity1 in the country (Ghana Statistical Service 2007). The livelihood classification used by GLSS shows poverty to be concentrated amongst “foodcorp farmers”, who are encountered disproportionately (but not exclusively) within the three northern regions. This group accounted for 43% of the population in 2005/06, but 69% of the headcount poor. Whilst the poverty rate amongst “food crop farmers” (68%) and “export The P2 poverty measure using the lower (extreme poverty) line.
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Sequencing of Investments for Agricultural Growth, Poverty Reduction
October 31, 2008 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}food-securityAs investment in agricultural development gains increasing prominence in Africa, amonggovernments and donors, there is renewed interest in developing strategic understanding of theinvestments that are needed to effectively and efficiently promote agricultural growth to benefit thepoor and improve food security.

This is a matter of particular concern in the design andimplementation of NEPAD’s Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program. NEPADand its partners are therefore planning to establish Regional Strategy and Knowledge SupportSystems (to be called ReSAKSS) to develop information and analytical capabilities to support theprioritization, design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of investment programs andactivities.

A meeting was held in Washington in June 2006 to discuss the establishment of theseReSAKSS. Attended by representatives from research institutions, regional economic communities,and donors, the two day meeting discussed first critical analytical issues that these systems andneed to address and process for the successful establishment of these systems. A critical issue for design of investment programmes is to ensure that investments are correctlysequenced.

To understand this, it is a necessary first to understand the major processes and stagesof agricultural development, of economic growth, and of poverty reduction.Agricultural growth, poverty reduction, and food security require complementary changes inpeople’s livelihoods and in the local and national economic environment. Livelihoods can behelpfully considered in terms of their contribution to three broad strategies which we term “hangingin” (maintenance and survival), “stepping up” (improvement and expansion of current activities),and “stepping out” (branching out to new activities).

These strategies are not mutually exclusive:most of us have some concerns to “hang in”, but development involves increasing opportunities for“stepping up” and “stepping out”. These transitions are particularly important to poor rural people,for whom agriculture is a major vehicle for “hanging in”, and, with agricultural growth, for“stepping up”. In the long run, however, agriculture is something from which most people “stepout” to employment in non-farm activities.

The growth of non farm employment opportunities,however, depends upon growth and structural change in the wider economy, including, of course,“stepping up” growth in agriculture.The processes of livelihoods and economic change and growth are highly inter-related anddependent upon each other. They depend upon, and are driven by, technical and institutionalchange which again interact and depend upon each other to raise the productivity of resources andfacilitate capital accumulation. Unfortunately, though, these processes can be impeded by a set ofmicro-, meso-, and macro- poverty traps.

Micro traps are well known, a vicious circle where peoplehave limited resources, which lead to low productivity, which leads to low incomes, which thenprevent the accumulation of resources. The trap is exacerbated by vulnerability to health, climate,and economic stresses and shocks, vulnerability which is increased by the low incomes and limitedresources of poor people.

The Global Fertiliser Crisis and Africa
June 1, 2008 / Miscellaneous

By Blessings Chinsinga
June 2008

Political and media attention has rightly been focused on recent increases in food and energy prices and their impacts on consumers and national economies, particularly poor consumers and poor economies but much greater increases in fertiliser prices have received much less attention in industrialised economies.

The impacts of these fertiliser price increases on many countries in Africa, however, are potentially very damaging in their effects on food security, poverty, and long term economic growth. In the many African countries that are heavily dependent on agriculture the impacts of high fertiliser prices and scarcity will extend beyond farmers to affect consumers, export earnings from cash crops, exchange rates, and the whole economy.

Fertiliser price increases

Fertiliser prices have risen dramatically in the last two years, more than oil and staple and cash crop prices (see figure 1). The scale and significance of these price increases is even more dramatic when fertiliser price changes are compared with changes in the prices of the crops they are used to produce. Table 1 shows that the real price of DAP, a major phosphate fertiliser, has increased by 320% over the last two years, and the real price of urea, a major nitrogenous fertiliser, has increased by 160%. Increases in real prices of major food crops were much smaller, though still substantial (increases in rice prices were roughly the same as increases in urea prices). Prices of oil and of export crops, for example cotton, were much more static. Much of the fertiliser price increases have occurred in the last 12 months, and while DAP and crop prices appear to have flattened in the last month or so, urea prices have continued to rise.

Causes

There are a number of reasons for these dramatic increases in fertiliser prices. Demand has increased as a result of higher food prices and increased use in biofuel production. Supply has been affected by increasing energy costs (which are particularly important in producing nitrogenous fertilisers), the introduction of export tariffs on some fertilisers (for example by China in April 2008), and capacity limits in expanding production to meet rising demand – particularly for phosphate rock. These influences have to be seen in the context of large shifts of funds into commodities, particularly into commodity index funds. These shifts have been encouraged by the fall in the value of the US dollar and low US interest rates, with the development of new commodity index investment instruments and funds (Masters, 2008).{jathumbnail off}{jcomments off}

Points of View
April 11, 2008 / Miscellaneous

PUT FARMERS FIRST TO TRANSFORM AGRICULTUREAchim Steiner

Agriculture and food are urgent global priorities with farmers on the front line of some of the world’s most pressing issues. Putting farmers at the vanguard of responses to the food crisis and climate change in Africa and beyond is vital.

Putting farmers at the centre of agricultural innovation and development is the subject of a new Practical Action Publishing book, Farmer First Revisited: Innovation for Agricultural Research and Development, edited by Ian Scoones and John Thompson, foreword by Robert Chambers and launched today in Nairobi, Kenya, by Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Carlos Sere, Director General, International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI).

The book’s 150 contributors review cases of farmer-led innovation in 30 countries around the world over the past twenty years. It aims to re-energise the debate about farmer involvement in agricultural research and development, refine the „farmer first approach? methodologies and set new challenges and goals for the immediate and long-term future.

Farmer First Revisited discusses:

  • The methods, institutions and support systems required to transform agriculture research and development systems
  • How farmer first approaches can help boost production and get the right seeds and other inputs into the hands of farmers
  • How farmers can lead climate adaptation responses, using local knowledge and systems to improve resilience and the capacity to change

The book is published twenty years after the original „Farmer First? book, when the idea of promoting farmer-led agricultural innovation was considered a marginal, almost subversive, issue. This was followed in 1994 with „Beyond Farmer First?. But today mainstream opportunities exist for transforming agriculture and putting farmers firmly in the driving seat of change.

In the intervening two decades, the Farmer First movement – a loose, informal network stretching across the world – has experimented with a range of participatory approaches to agricultural research and extension with farmers at the heart of the innovation process.

Participatory plant breeding, for example, has involved farmers in the process of choosing and testing new crop varieties. Extension systems have equally been transformed, moving from top-down instruction towards farmer-to-farmer exchange and joint learning. The use of new information technologies has expanded too, allowing information sharing between farmers. As a result, farmers are increasingly seen as partners in the innovation process, rather than merely recipients of national and international research and extension systems.

Yet failures of conventional agriculture and associated institutional arrangements are apparent everywhere. The generation of an African Green Revolution, for example, requires a new agriculture based on partnerships, not top-down impositions and rooted in diverse knowledges rather than singular technical solution. Wider perspectives on innovation, linking with research and markets, technology development and users are needed.

Judi Wakhungu, Executive Director, African Centre for Technology Studies, Nairobi, Kenya and co-chair International Assessment of Agricultural Science, Knowledge and Technology for Development (IAASTD) argues the book shows “why we need to continue questioning conventional assumptions about agriculture, and why multiple knowledges and sources of innovation are more important than ever.”

That opportunities exist for farmers to drive this innovation are especially evident in Africa. Government commitments through the CAADP/NEPAD framework are in place; funding support is being channelled through organisations like AGRA; and policy wider commitments are being affirmed by the IAASTD, the World Bank’s World Development Report on agriculture and the discussions around the Global Partnership for Agriculture.

And as this new book shows, there are two decades of „farmer first? experiences to build on.

Gordon Conway, Chief Scientific Adviser at the UK Department for International Development (DFID) notes: “Twenty years on and the concepts and practices of Farmer First remain powerful and compelling, and even more relevant in today’s world”.

Joachim Voss, former Director General of the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture in Colombia comments: “Farmer First has won broad acceptance by rigorously proving its superior efficiency in making science work for the poorest and most marginal farmers. It is indeed a pleasure to see how the established and dedicated practitioners, together with a new generation of committed young scientists, have built upon the original concepts and methods to create this dynamic, exciting and effective corpus of work.”

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Rising food prices: A global crisis
April 1, 2008 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Rising_food_pricesSoaring food prices pose problems for three groups. First, the poor whose ability to buy food is undermined. Second, governments of low-income countries facing higher import bills, soaring costs for safety net programmes and political unrest.

Third, aid agencies juggling increased demands for food, cash and technical advice. High food prices threaten the gains of the 1960s and highlight the long-term need for investment in, and better management of, the global food supply. This Paper examines the causes of rising food prices, expected trends, the likely impact, and possible policy responses.

Evaluation of the 2006/7 Agricultural Input Subsidy Programme, Malawi: Final Report
March 12, 2008 / Miscellaneous

This report evaluates the 2006/7 Malawi Government Agricultural Input Subsidy Programme (AISP). The main objective of the evaluation is to assess the impact and implementation of the AISP in order to provide lessons for future interventions in growth and social protection. The evaluation combined qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and analysis.

Quantitative data were collected through a national survey in 2007 of 2,491 households who were previously interviewed in the 2004/05 Integrated Household Survey, a survey of retail shops selling inputs in six districts and data on stocks and sales from manufacturers, large-scale importers and dealers of fertilizers and seeds.

The quantitative data was triangulated by qualitative data from focus group discussions with smallholder farmers in 12 districts, and key informant interviews with government staff, input distributors and beneficiary and non-beneficiary households. The analysis is based on descriptive statistics, econometric modelling and livelihood and rural economy modelling. An Interim Report in March 2007 provides fuller details of the implementation of the programme.

Mid Term Review Future Agricultures Consortium
November 1, 2007 / Miscellaneous

The Future Agricultures Consortium (FAC) is a project funded by the Renewable NaturalResources and Agriculture Mid_Term_Review_Future_Agricultures_Consortium(RNRA) Team of DFID’s Policy Division. It is a project that has the aim to improve the quality of public policy towards agriculture in low income Sub- Saharan Africa (SSA) countries. This objective arises from DFID’s Policy Paper onagriculture published in 2005 (DFID, 2005), in which the central importance of agricultural growth for poverty reduction in countries where the majority of the poor live in rural areas is affirmed. The project began in May 2005 and is scheduled to complete its current phase in March 2008. The project team has submitted a proposal to DFID for a second phase of the project to last from April 2008 to March 2011. The tasks of this mid-term review are asfollows (see Review TOR at Annex A):

(a) to assess the likelihood of FAC meeting its purpose to ‘encourage dialogue and sharing ofgood practice by policy makers and opinion formers in developing countries on the roleof agriculture in broad based growth’;
(b) to make recommendations on the FAC plan for the remaining 6 months of their currentfunding period (to March 2008); and
(c) to make recommendations on the FAC proposal for extension and expansion beyondMarch 2008.

Agriculture has certainly been moving up the strategic poverty reduction agenda in SSA.Agriculture often has a key position in individual country’s PRSPs (for example, the EthiopiaPASDEP is largely built around a strategy entitled Agricultural Development LedIndustrialization), and the sector has become a priority strategic focal point for NEPAD in theshape of its Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).

Many international reports on the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals have alsoaccorded agriculture special strategic priority; for example, the UN Millennium Project(2005), the Africa Commission (2005), and of course most recently the World DevelopmentReport 2008 (World Bank, 2007), the preparation of which involved significant contributionsfrom members of FAC.FAC operates at the intersection of knowledge and policy.

This is a difficult intersection atwhich to work. On the one hand, the knowledge side of this interaction may be incomplete,contested, and complex to the extent that straightforward messages are difficult to formulateand convey. On the other hand, policy often represents a considerable dead weight of pastpractice, entrenched organizations and interests, and unwillingness to reorder priorities.Moreover, the personal and political interests that make some policy options more attractivethan others to public decision makers can be exceedingly difficult to decipher or anticipate.

What FAC sets out to do is to try to open up this policy space so that information and optionscan circulate more freely, and good ideas may stand a better chance of being taken up. Thereis no doubt that this is a worthwhile activity. FAC’s relative success to date in achieving thisobjective, and the way it might go about doing this more effectively in the future, are thefocal points of this review.

FAC Meetings Series, Autumn 2007
October 1, 2007 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}FAC-meetingEarly in the new century a consensus on agricultural and rural development emerged that provided renewed impetus to efforts to boost both agricultural development and the rural non-farm economy, in a context of ever closer rural-urban linkages and globalisation.

Both governments and donors have committed themselves to support this.The challenge has been to translate themes into practical policy. For two years the Future Agricultures Consortium, supported by DFID, has been investigating how to do this,primarily in Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi.

This set of meetings presents of the results of this work. It also includes the World Bank presenting the 2008 World Development Report on Agriculture and Development, and two sessions on the way forward and whether or not emerging challenges from biofuels, climate change, and the growth of China and India imply that the agenda needs radical revision.

Synthesis Report for Theme III. Growth and Social Protection
October 1, 2007 / Miscellaneous

By Rachel Sabates-Wheeler, Andrew Dorward, John Omiti, Stephen Devereux, Amdissa Teshome, Ephraim Chirwa
October 2007

This report describes the main activities and outputs of the Future Agriculture Consortium(FAC) under the theme of Growth and Social Protection for Phase I. Core work on the theme has involved the development of a conceptual framework setting out potential and evolving synergies and conflicts between social protection and agricultural growth in the livelihoods of poor and vulnerable people, in local and national economies, and in policy formulation and implementation.

Publication and discussion of the framework has led to its uptake outside the FAC and in the country theme work. In Ethiopia and Malawi this has engaged strongly with evaluations and national and donor policy reviews of innovative and major national social protection and/or agricultural growth policies.

Such engagement has, necessarily, followed the national rather than FAC timetable, and hence theme work in these two countries has not reached the planned September completion; this is a price worth paying for the opportunities to learn from and contribute to these major national programmes, which have continent-wide relevance. In Kenya, theme work has explored, with national stakeholders, the multiple and often uncoordinated social protection interventions of different players, as well as their actual and potential interactions with agricultural development.

This work has generated considerable interest and provides a platform for rethinking and improving policies and interventions. Work on this theme has achieved considerable leverage through its integration with non-FAC work being conducted by FAC-members and by stimulating interest in the theme by other players. There are also strong cross-theme linkages through work on the policy processes of social protection and agricultural policy development, and through recognition of the importance of labour markets and on- and off-farm diversification in social protection /agriculture livelihood linkages.

Further work in the remainder of Phase I will involve writing up and reporting the work in Ethiopia and Malawi, and synthesis of this with other work being conducted by consortium members, with particular emphasis on cross-country lesson-learning.
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Agricultural Commercialisations
September 24, 2007 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Agricultural_CommercialisationsAccelerated growth in agriculture is seen by many as critical to meeting MDGs in Africa. Many national governments and international development agencies see intensification and commercialisation of smallholder agriculture playing a central role in achieving poverty reduction. The potential bene.ts of commercialisation are well documented.

According to this thinking, smallholder agriculture is uniquely positioned to deliver broad-based growth in rural areas, where the vast majority of the world’s poor people still live. Others fear that strategies for commercialising agriculture will not bring bene.ts to the majority of poor rural households, either directly or, in the view of some, at all. Instead, they fear that efforts to promote a more commercial agriculture will benefit primarily large-scale farms. At best, a minority of better-off smallholders will be able to bene. This paper from the Future Agricultures Consortium considers alternative perspectives on agricultural commercialisation. The paper attempts to get away from the idea that there is one ideal commercial agriculture, following a linear path to some clearly de.ned end point.

Commercialisations can take different pathways, especially if simple distinctions, e.g. between ‘food’ and ‘cash’ crops, are avoided. The authors argue for a diverse range of commercialisations, locally speci.c trajectories, and engagement with both domestic and export markets. Growth-poverty reduction linkages for smallholder farmers through commercialized agriculture do not lie along just one or two channels.

Lessons from Malawi’s 2005/2006 Fertilizer Subsidy Programme
July 1, 2007 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Lessons_from_MalawiThis paper is based on research work carried out the under auspices of the Politics and Policy Processes theme of the Future Agricultures Consortium (FAC). It demonstrates that political context matters in agricultural development policy issues, using as illustration the case of the fertilizer subsidy programme (FSP) launched in Malawi in the 2005/2006 growing season.

This case study was chosen due to the widely orchestrated narratives of success surrounding the fertilizer subsidy story, particularly from the government and various sections of the society at large. Narratives of success are debited to the government.s determination to implement the programme despite strong resistance from certain donors, private sector captains and a wide array of technical experts which ended the country’s persistent failure to produce adequate food to feed itself for a period close to two decades. The country achieved food self sufficiency without having to take recourse to imports or donations for the first time in many years.

Previous interventions, notably, the Starter Pack (SP) and the Targeted Input Programme (TIP) failed to bring to an end the problem of endemic food insecurity in Malawi. The 2005/2006 maize harvest registered a record high of 2.72 million tones, nearly 0.25 million tones greater that the previous estimated harvest pegged at 2.5 million tones in the 1999/2000 growing season achieved with the combination of good rains and the starter pack programme (cf. Doward, et al. 2007). The success narrative has been further strengthened by the turnaround among several donors in their characterization and perception of the programme.

From totally condemning the programme as non-viable, the majority of the donors are now willing to engage with it provided the government is prepared to refine some elements of the programme.s design and procedures of implementation. The magnitude of success of the 2005/2006 subsidy programme remains, however, a subject of contentious debate. The main argument of the paper is that no matter what the technical arguments for or against (cf. John, 1998; Keeley and Scoones, 2003).

Contrary to the traditional and highly stylized perspective, policymaking does not happen in neat distinct stages except perhaps in a minimal sense that policies have to be proposed, legislated and implemented. Policy processes are instead a complex mesh of interactions and ramifications between a wide range of stakeholders who are driven and constrained by the contexts within which they operate.These developments require a radically different framework for understanding policy processes altogether.

According to the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) (2006) and Oya (2006), understanding the policy processes require:

(1) grasping the narratives that tell the policy stories;

(2) the way policy positions become embedded in networks of various actors; and

(3) the enabling or constraining power dynamics (politics and interests).

This suggests that policy processes, among other things, encapsulate power struggles, ideological contexts, patterns of social mobilization, struggle for political legitimacy, the force of external pressures and changing technical fashions. It is therefore imperative to go beyond the narrowly defined technical expertise and to recognize that policies as well as their implementation must be negotiated outcomes, requiring the involvement of multiple stakeholders with different interests (Scoones, et al., 2005).

This augurs very well with the current case study as it clearly demonstrates that agricultural policy processes are driven essentially by political forces and as such they cannot be fully understood without understanding the political economy surrounding them. Infact, in predominantly agro based economies; the political survival of governments greatly depends on perceptions of the success of agricultural policy processes judged largely on the basis of delivering on food security at whatever cost (cf. Johnston, 1996 and Oya, 2006). It is thus not surprising that the government of Malawi has been politically and not necessarily technically tactful in handling the fertilizer subsidy programme geared at revitalizing the agricultural sector with the view of achieving food security that has eluded successive governments since the turn of the 1990s.

The government implemented the fertilizer subsidy programme in the face of fierce donor resistance who argued that the programme run counter to the ongoing economic liberalization efforts but perhaps more critically the programme was criticized as placing unnecessary fiscal burden on the state to be sustainable in the long-run. The government implemented the programme to the tune of MK 7.1 against the initial budget of MK 4.7 billion without any donor support. This study drew essentially on the review of secondary sources (press reports, academic papers,government and donor documents) and on key informant interviews with officials from government, donor agencies, civil society and the private sector.

The analysis is structured along five sections. After this introduction, Section 2 explains the origins and context for the fertilizer subsidy programme. Section 3 provides details on the programme and the evolution in thinking within government. Section 4 discusses three different donor positions on the fertilizer programme: those totally opposing it, those supporting it and those reluctant but willing to engage with the government.s policy. Section 5 analyses the programme.s impact and adjustments in government and donor positions. Section 6 provides someconcluding reflections.

Too Much Inequality or Too Little, Inequality and Stagnation in Ethiopian Agriculture
July 2, 2006 / Miscellaneous

inequalityThe agricultural sector remains our Achilles heel and source of vulnerability …Nonetheless, were main convinced that agricultural based development remains the only source of hope for Ethiopia. (PrimeMinister Meles Zenawi 2000).

A powerful strand of thinking about the causes of long-term agricultural stagnation in Ethiopia defines the problem in terms of inequality. Indeed, it is possible to interpret most Ethiopian agricultural policy initiatives of the past three decades in terms of divergent views on the extent and consequences of rural inequality.

This article investigates the hypothesis that (too little rather than too much) inequality has contributed to agriculture’s under performance, and considers the implications for policy in terms of four alternative pathways for Ethiopian agriculture. Any Ethiopian over 40 years old has lived through three remarkably different political regimes:

  • the feudal imperial era under Emperor Haile Selassie;
  • the socialist military dictatorship of ColonelMengistu’s Derg; and
  • the market-oriented,Westernaligned democracy of PrimeMinister Meles Zenawi.

Each regime has imposed an entirely different set of policies on smallholder agriculture, where over 80 per cent of the population makes its living, yet all three have presided over an agricultural sector that is stagnant and acutely vulnerable to recurrent drought and other livelihood shocks. Following the “creeping coup” that overthrew Emperor Haile Selassie during the 1974 famine,the Derg implemented a radical agrarian transformation based on redistribution of land.

Between 1976 and 1991, all rain-fed farmland in highland Ethiopia was confiscated and redistributed,after adjusting for soil quality and family size, among all rural households. This land reform was motivated not only by the Derg’s Marxist egalitarian ideology, but by its conviction that feudal relations in agriculture had exposed millions of highland Ethiopians to intolerable levels of poverty andvulnerability. Redistribution therefore had both equity and efficiency objectives. It was implementedas a mechanism not just for breaking the power of the landlords, but also for eradicating historically entrenched inequalities in control over land, with the aim of achieving sustainable increases in agricultural productivity and rural incomes.

Was the Derg’s economic analysis flawed? Hindsight suggests that the land reform was a political success but an economic failure. The Derg period is now remembered as a time of militarisation, war and repression, the worst African famine of the twentieth century, economic stagnation and failed development programmes –villagisation, state farms, forced resettlement. Redistributing land may or may not have been anecessary step for enhancing rural livelihoods, but it was evidently not sufficient. The Derg’s land reforms did not extend to the right to buy and sell land, which constitutionally belongs jointly to the state and the people.

Narratives of Agricultural Policy in Africa: What Role for Ministries of Agriculture
March 20, 2006 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Ministry_of_agricultureMuch policy research on African agriculture has focused more on ‘what policy’ type of questions,rather than on the processes by which policy is made and implemented (Omamo, 2004). The focus has been on ‘policy fixes’, based often on idealised models of the ways things should be, rather than the way they are, or are likely to be.

Researchers, consultants, donor agencies and decision-makersat government offices therefore concentrate on devising solutions for problems and overlook the complexities of the process of translating such elaborate, technical policy prescriptions into practice. Much of this translation role is left to ministries of agriculture. But what role should they play giventhe policy debates raging about the future of agriculture in Africa?

This paper provides a preliminary contribution to the debate on agricultural policy processes by focusing on the current roles and capacity of ministries of agriculture in devising and delivering agricultural policies. By unpacking the different ‘narratives’ – or storylines – about agricultural policies being pushed by different actors in the policy process, the paper asks what kind of ministry of agriculture is envisaged, either implicitly or explicitly? Three different versions are elaborated.

One sees the return of the hey-day of the sectoral ministry with capacity and policy clout – to address the major constraints of agriculture, it is argued, what is required is a strong, well-funded line ministry, and the challenge today is to rebuild such an organisation. A second – at the other extreme – sees such sector all ministries taking on a minimal role, focused on oversight and regulation, as the private sector takes on a more substantive role in a ‘free-market’ environment.

A third, perhaps less stridently articulated than the other narratives, sees an important role for the state – and the ministry of agriculture,together with other state agencies – in addressing the coordination and intermediation roles of getting markets to work effectively, while ensuring at the same time public efforts are targeted to poverty reduction. Which of these models – or hybrids and variants of them – make sense today? The analysis in this paper is conducted around two hypotheses.

The first is that, in the twenty-first century, ministries ofagriculture are no longer the key architect and driver of agricultural policies and policy reform. Other public sector agencies and non-state actors play, increasingly, a more central role in the reform and development of the agriculture sector. Indeed, over the years, the position of the state inthe agriculture sector seems to have been continuously eroded by a series of interconnected factors,which include inter alia:

(i) the demise of the socialist model of state intervention;

(ii) thewidespread adoption of the orthodox liberalization/privatisation approach to economic growth;

(iii) the structural transformation of the global economy (both at political, economic, social and culturallevels) driven to a large extent by the dramatic fall in transportation and communication costs;

(iv)the pervasive discourse on government failure, particularly in Africa; and

(v) the expansion of thethird (non-governmental and not-for-profit) sector beyond emergency relief, responding to both stateand market failures, and now emerging as an important actor in the development process.

These have contributed to the reshaping of agricultural governance structures, as well as of functions and structures of ministries of agriculture – including withdrawal from direct involvement production and marketing activities, privatization of public-sector enterprises, allegedly greater emphasis of the public sector on regulatory and enabling functions and provision of classic public goods (rural infrastructures and research) and development of new partnerships and outsourcing arrangements with the private and NGO sectors. Concomitantly, and to some extent in consistency with the above,there has been, over the last two decades, a persistent reduction in the amount of financial resources(domestic and external) allocated to the agriculture sector and to ministries of agriculture inparticular.

Future Scenarios for Agriculture in Malawi
March 19, 2006 / Miscellaneous

{jathumbnail off}Future_Scenarios_for_Agriculture_in_MalawiMalawi is one of the poorest countries in the world with per capita gross domestic product of $190, 30 percent of under-five children being malnourished and the infant mortality rate of 229 per 1,000 live births and a life expectancy at birth of 42 years (World Bank, 2001).

Data from a recent household survey shows that about 52.4 percent of the population lived below the poverty line, with 22.4 percent barely surviving in 2004 (NSO, 2005). There are gender differences in food insecurity with 62.9 percent of female-headed households and 54.6 percent of male-headed households reporting inadequate food consumption.

Report on the Future Agricultures Workshop, Awassa, SNNPR
March 1, 2006 / Miscellaneous

Future Agricultures is the UK Department for International Development funded learningconsortium comprising the Institute of Development Studies, Imperial College London and the Overseas Development Institute. The Consortium has been formed to stimulate debate and generate policy options for agricultural growth. The study focuses on three countries, namely Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi. As local partners of the Consortium the Ethiopia team was tasked with initiating policydebate through key informant interviews and where possible holding discussions in a form of workshops. The Awassa 2006 is one such workshop.

Organisation of the workshop. The Ethiopia team contracted a local NGO based in Awassa to organise the workshop. Participants were carefully selected from a range of institutions – government bureaus, nongovernment, research and academic institutions. A total of 22 individuals from Awassa and about 10 from Addis Ababa showed interest. However, a total of 21 participants (14 regional and 7 Addis Ababa) attended the one-day workshop. It was unfortunate that that all those registered could not attend because the workshop coincided with government meetings.