Policy Processes - Consortium Outputs

NEW! Working Paper: The Social Protection Policy in Malawi: Processes, Politics and Challenges

NEW! Working Paper: Reclaiming Policy Space: Lessons from Malawi's 2005/2006 Fertilizer Subsidy Programme

NEW! Discussion Paper: Rethinking Agricultural Input Subsidies in Poor Rural Economies. See also the associated Powerpoint presentation

Future Agricultures presentations from the 2007 Ethiopian Economics Association annual conference. Please see the 'further reading' column on the right.

World Devlopment Report briefings:

Briefing: Politics and the Future of Ministries of Agriculture: Rethinking Roles and Transforming Agendas

What form should a contemporary Ministry of Agriculture take, and how should it function? The answers to these questions depend on three
major issues set within the context of
agriculture...

Briefing: Reclaiming Policy Space: Lessons from Malawi's Fertiliser Subsidy Programme

This case study argues that political context matters in agricultural development issues. No matter what the technical or economic arguments for or against particular policy positions are, it is ultimately the configuration of political interests that influence agricultural policy outcomes on the ground.

Briefing: The Limits of Success: The Case of the Dairy Sector in Kenya

By examining the underlying policy narratives and the changing actors and networks associated with
different interests, this case study briefly explores the politics of the policy process behind the dairy
sector story in Kenya and asks what have been the conditions for the apparent sustained success, and what are the limits?

NEW!

Presentations and Workshop Report:
Future Agricultures/World Bank discussion workshop on the 2008 World Development Report

The main purpose of this workshop was to engage with the World Development Report 2008 process and offer contributions on how to incorporate a political economy dimension into the report.

The workshop was attended by members of the WDR 2008 team, DFID representatives and FAC consortium members. The workshop consisted of presentations (WB on the WDR and FAC on ongoing work), plenary discussions and brainstorming sessions. Emerging out of these fruitful exchanges was the undisputed message that politics matter and are a key determinant of processes of policy generation and change.

Briefing: Narratives of Agricultural Policy in Africa: What Role for Ministries of Agriculture?

This briefing paper explores how policy narratives on the role of the state in agriculture have influenced and defined the role of ministries of agriculture in Africa. Although buying into free-market ideology, MoAs have offered resistance to the interanal reform of institutional structures and working practices.

The full paper (40 pages) is available here.

Briefing: Donor Policy Narratives: What Role
for Agriculture?

How do international agencies concerned with agricultural development see the role of agriculture? What is the role for the market and the state? This briefing examines four recent statements from major aid agencies, asking how they see the role of agriculture in development.

Briefing: Pathways for Ethiopian Agriculture:
Options and Scenarios

Ethiopia has drafted the second PRSP in the shape of a Plan for Accelerated and Sustainable Development to End Poverty (PASDEP). The new document has intensified the debate on agriculture both locally and internationally. The key question is: how do debates about growth and poverty reduction relate to agriculture? This briefing explores tensions, trade-offs, and policy controversies in the PRSP document.

The full research paper on which this Briefing is based can be found here

Briefing: Agriculture, Growth and Poverty Reduction in Ethiopia: Policy Processes Around the New PRSP (PASDEP)

Trade-offs between growth and poverty reduction and the role of agriculture are major contemporary
issues in debates about future agricultures in Africa. This briefing explores the policy processes surrounding the second Ethiopian PRSP, and the implications this has for agricultural policy and rural development more broadly.

The full research paper on which this Briefing is based can be found here

Briefing: Agricultural Policy in Kenya

Rosemary Atieno and Patrick Alila describe the key policy issues for Kenyan agriculture, which include a need to increase productivity and encourage diversification into non-traditional commodities. What are the opportunities and constraints to realising these?

Part 1: Policy Issues and the Strategy for Revitalising Agriculture

Part 2: Policy Processes, Structures and Actors

The full research paper on which these Briefings are based can be found here.

Briefing: Future Scenarios for Agriculture in Malawi

What are the fundamental challenges for Malawi's agricultural development and smallholder farmers? A two-part briefing from Ephraim Chirwa, Jonathan Kydd and Andrew Dorward.

part 1: Concepts

part 2: Policy

The full paper on which these Briefings are based is available here.

Working Paper: Reforming agricultural policy: lessons from
four countries

Comparing reform of agricultural policy in Bangladesh, Chile, China and New Zealand, this paper derives lessons for countries contemplating reform. It finds that where where outcomes are uncertain and state capacity limited, gradual approaches to reform that allow for learning may be better than swift and comprehensive ⎯ ‘big bang’ ⎯ packages.

A summary of this paper is also available.

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The agricultural sector in Africa is not delivering its potential contribution to economic growth and poverty alleviation. There is some evidence and increasing conjecture that this is due as much to weaknesses in policy processes as to weaknesses in conceptual understanding of agriculture and its role in economic development. There is a long history of enquiry into agricultural sector development in Africa from the perspectives of policy economy and institutional development as well as conceptual understanding of the role of agriculture in economic development and poverty alleviation. However these studies have tended to be pursued with separate intellectual communities with few attempts to synthesise lessons for agricultural development from the different approaches.

The Future Agricultures consortium has therefore set itself the following tasks:

To review lines of intellectual enquiry relevant to understanding policy processes in the light of political democratisation and economic liberalisation across the sub-continent, and identify what these can tell us about how best agricultural policy processes in Africa can be supported in the early 21st Century.
To reach preliminary conclusions, based on conceptual understanding and review of empirical evidence, on the extent policy processes are constraining agricultural sector development in Africa at the present time.

Policy Processes - Consortium Outputs

Further Reading