The Global Fertiliser Crisis and Africa

Posted on June 1, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

By the Future Agricultures Consortium
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.

Getting Agricultural Moving: Role of the State in Increasing Staple Food Crop Productivity…

Posted on June 1, 2008 by - Research Papers

Getting Agricultural Moving: Role of the State in Increasing Staple Food Crop Productivity with Special Reference to Coordination, Input Subsidies, Credit and Price Stabilisation

By Colin Poulton and Andrew Dorward
June 2008

This paper argues that the state has a large potential role in increasing staple food crop productivity as a result of:

  1. The importance of staple food crop intensification in driving and supporting pro-poor growth in poor rural areas
  2. Active state involvement was a pervasive feature of Asian green revolutions, but the task is not easy, particularly with the varied and often difficult agro-ecological conditions in Africa, the lack of irrigation infrastructure, likely impacts of climate change, the limited human and financial resources available to governments, and the political challenges facing governments in pursuing consistent policies.
  3. Increasing staple food crop productivity requires governments, with private sector actors, farmers and civil society, to address a number of challenges.

These are posed by specific technical constraints to productivity increases:

  • Lack of important public goods (principally infrastructure and institutions)
  • Recent dramatic increases in food and fertiliser prices; poor policy coordination
  • Lack of complementary coordination in rural service development and provision
  • The food price/ productivity tightrope
  • Un-affordability of on-farm productivity investments; and high price instability

The nature of and solutions to these challenges, and hence the nature and importance of responses to them, vary between three different types of crop – characterised as high response cereals (maize and rice), low response cereals (sorghum and millet), and roots and tubers (cassava and yams).

The crisis of pastoralism?

Posted on May 1, 2008 by - Discussion Papers

By Stephen Devereux and Ian Scoones
May 2008

part of discussions on the future of pastoral production systems in East Africa there have been a number of recent interventions arguing that something urgently needs to be done to deal with a Malthusian style crisis in pastoral areas. In short, the argument goes, there are too many people which, combined with a declining (or not increasing) productivity of the natural resource base, means that not enough livestock can be kept to sustain a viable pastoral system.

This argument has been most eloquently and effectively argued by Stephen Sandford in “Too many people, too few livestock: the crisis affecting pastoralists in the Greater Horn of Africa”. This is a response to this piece, aimed at sparking a wider discussion.and another focusing on the market potentials of a ‘livestock revolution’ What should we make of these positions? What should the practical and policy responses be?

Such a discussion is urgently needed. For at the same time as the pessimistic prognoses about pastoralist futures in the Greater Horn of Africa, there has been, for the first time in several decades, a revival of interest in pastoralism and livestock production. This takes two forms – one a celebration of the ‘pastoral way of life’ and the importance of indigenous systems of production and management

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The crisis of pastoralism?

Posted on May 1, 2008 by - Discussion Papers

By Stephen Devereux and Ian Scoones

As part of discussions on the future of pastoral production systems in East Africa there have been a number of recent interventions arguing that something urgently needs to be done to deal with a Malthusian style crisis in pastoral areas. In short, the argument goes, there are too many people which, combined with a declining (or not increasing) productivity of the natural resource base, means that not enough livestock can be kept to sustain a viable pastoral system. This argument has been most eloquently and effectively argued by Stephen Sandford in “Too many people, too few livestock: the crisis affecting pastoralists in the Greater Horn of Africa”. This is a response to this piece, aimed at sparking a wider discussion.

Toward A Green Revolution in Africa?

Posted on April 30, 2008 by - Events

Kofi-Annan-crop-3i30 April – 2 May 2008 Toward a ‘Green Revolution’ in Africa?” is an Initiative of the Salzburg Global Seminar, the Institute of Development Studies and the Future Agricultures Consortium. The Initiative, through a series of interconnected events, seeks to:

  • Enable proposals for a “green revolution” in sub-Saharan Africa to be tested and refined through deliberations between a wide range of experts, including those concerned by current directions, from different sectors and regions. This approach will help proponents of a “green revolution” to think it through carefully and from multiple perspectives, provide opportunity for constructive dialogue with critics, and ensure that efforts proceed within a broad policy framework, taking into account institutional, political, socio-economic, and technical prerequisites.

  • Better define a holistic development framework within which new investments in African agriculture can be positioned, streamlined with other new and existing development investments, and help stimulate further investments (monetary and other), ultimately reducing poverty and increasing sustainable economic growth and opportunity.

The Initiative was launched at a landmark conference, April 30 – May 2, 2008, at the Salzburg Global Seminar at which Kofi Annan provided the keynote speech.

Kofi Annan, the Chairman of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and Louis Michel, European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid recently kick started a process aimed at implementing a truly participatory and pro-poor African Green Revolution at a conference recently, organised by the Future Agricultures Consortium in partnership with Salzburg Global Seminar.

There is a clear need for a new vision for agricultural development in Africa that can deal with the complexities of agriculture in diverse settings across Africa and meet the conditions necessary to achieve more equitable benefits for Africa’s farmers. The conference was asking

  • Whose vision should this be?
  • How can complexity and diversity be dealt with?
  • What can be learned from the impacts – positive and negative – of the “green revolutions” in Latin America and Asia?

The “Toward a ‘Green Revolution’ in Africa?” conference and subsequent seminar asked what lessons can be extracted from recent successes in African agricultural development and how can recent growth be sustained, expanded, and accelerated? How can new investments and actors in African agriculture support efforts to align policies and political processes to support agricultural as well as broader development goals? How can innovation systems be made robust, relevant and sustainable? How can the hardware of science and technology be linked to the software of institutions, policy and social dynamics? How should agricultural science and technology in Africa be governed?

Held at Austria’s famous Schloss Leopoldskron, the conference laid the groundwork for the broader initiative and goals described above by bringing together diverse stakeholders, from within Africa and beyond, who are experts in their areas. Around 90 participants from predominantly African government, business, academia, and non-governmental organisations explored a set of issues of vital concern to the future of agriculture in Africa, and to Africa’s development agenda.

The group devised the conceptual framework within which a new agricultural development agenda in Africa can be set and implemented, and recommended specific actions. A set of African regional meetings will follow the conference and seminar. These subsequent events will refine ideas and recommendations for policy adjustments, streamlining practice, and creating strategic alliances, finally leading to an action plan that is based both on the priority issues and grounded in the realities of the African context(s).

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YARA Prize

Posted on April 21, 2008 by - News

The Yara Prize for a Green Revolution in Africa is awarded annually by a foundation set up by Yara International ASA, which has been doing business in Africa for 30 years. The prize honors significant contributions to the reduction of hunger and poverty in Africa. It’s meant to recognize dedication to the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals and the call for an African Green Revolution.

The Yara Prize honors work that increases food productivity, security or availability through improvements in food systems, advancements in sustainable agriculture and development of local markets. The prize aims to encourage innovation and entrepreneurship.

The prize was launched in 2005 and consists of a USD 100,000 grant, a glass trophy and a diploma. Winners are chosen by The Yara Foundation, with the foundation’s board serving as prize jury.

FANRPAN supports women farmers

Posted on April 21, 2008 by - News

fanrpan_logoThe Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) announced today a three-year pilot project to help rural women farmers influence agricultural policy development in Southern Africa. Funding for the programme is provided by a $900,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The project, Women Accessing Realigned Markets (WARM), seeks to strengthen women farmers’ ability to advocate for appropriate agricultural policies and programmes. The goal is for women farmers to have access to the tools that help them farm more successfully, such as access to credit and better seeds, by ensuring that local and national policies and services address their needs.

In Africa, the majority of rural farmers are women. At the same time, research demonstrates women are often excluded from the decision-making process and local governance. As a result, the needs of women farmers are often not reflected in local and national agricultural policy. By empowering women farmers to advocate for their concerns, the WARM project aims to ensure women farmers have what they need to increase their income and provide for their families.

Women are often marginalised in business relations and have minimal control over access to factors of production like land, inputs such as seed and fertilizer, credit and technology. Due to a combination of logistical, cultural and economic factors, they are often not able to benefit fully from development programmes and services. The WARM project will use an innovative tool, Theatre for Policy Advocacy, to engage leaders, service providers and policymakers, encourage community participation, and research the needs of women farmers. Amakhosi Theatre Company from Zimbabwe will lead theatre groups in crafting policy messages to amplify the voices of women and demonstrate the challenges they face.

FANRPAN is piloting the project in two countries – Mozambique and Malawi. Results and findings from these two countries will be extended to other Southern and East African countries with a combined total population of 400 million.

The WARM project will leverage FANRPAN’s experience as a regional multi-stakeholder policy research network to bridge the divide between women farmers, researchers and agricultural policy processes, with the goal of increasing women farmers’ access to markets. FANRPAN will partner with other foundation grantees, including regional and national farmers organisations, national research institutions and universities, community based groups, and national and regional policymakers to ensure farmers have access to markets, extension services, better seeds, adequate fertilizer and other important resources.

This grant is part of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Agricultural Development initiative. This initiative is working with a wide range of partners in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia to provide millions of small farmers, most of whom are women, in the developing world with tools and opportunities to boost their yields, increase their incomes, and build better lives for themselves and their families. The foundation is working to strengthen the entire agricultural value chain – from seeds and soil to farm management and market access – so that progress against hunger and poverty is sustainable over the long term. {jathumbnail off}

About FANRPAN:
FANRPAN is a multi-stakeholder, multi-national network that supports the development of better food, agriculture and natural resources (FANR) policies in southern Africa. The thriving multi-tiered network consists of more than 670 members (a diverse group of organisations including universities, farmer organisations, businesses, government agencies and civil society organisations that have a stake in the FANR policy process) organised into national nodes in thirteen Southern African countries.

Please contact policy@fanrpan.org for further details.

Agricultural Commercialisation

Posted on April 16, 2008 by - Pathways to Commercialisation

This theme examines the question of how to raise productivity in the agricultural sector, and how smallholder farmers can participate in markets and improve livelihoods. Recognising that the liberalisation orthodoxy focusing on markets has not worked (or at least only partially), we focus on institutional questions, particularly in conditions where markets are weak, thin and interlocking. Questions we will be pursuing are:

  • What pathways to which types of commercialisation are open to smallholder producers?
  • What market and institutional innovation in supply chains might help smallholder producers?
  • How do labour markets and institutions affect agricultural growth and poverty reduction?
  • How can coordination failures in finance, input and output supply be remedied?
  • How can agri-business be developed and regulated?

The Politics of Hunger: How Illusion and Greed Fan the Food Crisis

Posted on April 16, 2008 by - Small Farm / Big Farm

“…reluctant peasants are right: their mode of production is ill suited to modern agricultural production, in which scale is helpful. In modern agriculture, technology is fast-evolving, investment is lumpy, the private provision of transportation infrastructure is necessary to counter the lack of its public provision, consumer food fashions are fast-changing and best met by integrated marketing chains, and regulatory standards are rising toward the holy grail of the traceability of produce back to its source….

Large organizations are better suited to cope with investment, marketing chains, and regulation. Yet for years, global development agencies have been leery of commercial agriculture, basing their agricultural strategies instead on raising peasant production. ….to ignore commercial agriculture as a force for rural development and enhanced food supply is surely ideological

…Over time, African peasant agriculture has fallen further and further behind the advancing commercial productivity frontier, and based on present trends, the region’s food imports are projected to double over the next quarter century. ….There are partial solutions to such problems through subsidies and credit schemes, but it should be noted that large-scale commercial agriculture simply does not face this particular problem: if output prices rise by more than input prices, production will be expanded.

A model of successful commercial agriculture is, indeed, staring the world in the face. In Brazil, large, technologically sophisticated agricultural companies have demonstrated how successfully food can be mass-produced. …..

…There are many areas of the world that have good land that could be used far more productively if properly managed by large companies. Indeed, large companies, some of them Brazilian, are queuing up to manage those lands. Yet over the past 40 years, African governments have worked to scale back large commercial agriculture…….

…Commercial agriculture is not perfect. Global agribusiness is probably overly concentrated, and a sudden switch to an unregulated land market would probably have ugly consequences. But allowing commercial organizations to replace peasant agriculture gradually would raise global food supply in the medium term.” (Full text: The Politics of Hunger: How Illusion and Greed Fan the Food Crisis)

Collier, Paul. “The Politics of Hunger: How Illusion and Greed Fan the Food Crisis.” Foreign AffairsNovember/December 2008

Millennium Villages: Is this at last the solution to African poverty?

Posted on April 14, 2008 by - FAC blog

It sounds great. And the prime advocate of the programme, Jeffrey Sachs, tells a convincing story; sufficiently convincing indeed to have raised approaching US$20m from generous philanthropists, foundations, corporations and governments (notably the Japanese), and encouraged the participation at the highest level of 10 countries across Africa in the pilot action research phase. Reviewing the available documentation on the project, however, much of all this seems very familiar. Who, for instance, remembers the experiments in integrated rural development from the 1970s? Who recalls the numerous NGO projects that pumped in resources only to see things falter once the project funding dried up? Is this just old wine in new bottles as some have claimed or something important and new?

Of the 12 initial Millennium villages, across different agro-ecological zones, several are located in the same countries where the Future Agricultures Consortium is working. In Ethiopia, Korano village in the Tigray was chosen, while in Kenya two villages were selected – one in western Kenya (Sauri), the site of past work by Millennium Villages project director Pedro Sanchez, and one in the pastoral north-east (Dertu). In Malawi a ‘hunger hotspot’ area near Zomba was chosen (Mwandama) where, according to the project website, “Earth Institute experts and local farmers worked around the clock in the fall of 2005 to distribute improved seeds and fertilizers to thousands of people in southern Malawi before the November rains came”.

These are all unquestionably poor communities, where the challenge of getting agriculture moving is key to reducing poverty and hunger. But is a concentrated effort focused on a very limited set of villages, with an emphasis largely on technical fixes really the solution? Is not the challenge of improving rural livelihoods in Africa more complex than this? What about institutional issues, politics and governance questions? And what plans are there for coordination of wider infrastructure and market linkages, especially if these cases – as the project advocates repeatedly state – are not to be yet another outside-funded island of success?

As the IDS Bulletin ‘New Directions for African Agriculture’ argued – focusing on the ‘fix’ at the micro-scale is not enough. This may bring important gains for a limited number of people for a limited period, but it is the sustained, long-term benefits of growth spurred by agriculture that is the target. As all the IFPRI studies of success in African agriculture show policies are key – and to get policies right this means attention to the complex arena of African politics. Taking a long-run view these studies showed too that success can be quite ephemeral. Boosts in maize production, for example, occurred in different parts of sub-Saharan Africa for periods when the combination of climate, economics and policy was right, but then the gains, often very suddenly, were lost. And this was not because of the absence of good seed and fertilizer – these have been available for maize at least since the 1950s.

Jeffrey Sachs argues strongly in a recent IRIN news service interview that: “There are no ‘magic bullets’, no single solution that will put an end to global poverty”. So far so good. But Sachs goes on to identify what he calls “quick wins” targeted on “hot spots” which if applied will go a long way to meeting hunger “targets”. The technocratic impulse is, it seems, not far away. Lessons from the past repeatedly suggest that apparently simple technocratic solutions – no matter how integrated, low-cost etc. – do not work in the longer term.

It is for this reason that the Future Agricultures Consortium focuses on the wider policy and institutional conditions for pro-poor agricultural growth, seeing the important priorities of investment – in infrastructure, equipment, skills and expertise – within this broader architecture. What is strikingly absent in the presentation at least of the Millennium Villages project is this wider institutional, political and policy context. Over the coming years, consortium partners in Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi will be hoping to generate a local policy dialogue about future agricultures and appropriate policy solutions at national and local scales. Hopefully this will be a good opportunity to examine the experiences of the Millennium villages and help shape future strategies.

Links


Millennium Villages: Ian Scoones of Future Agricultures quoted in Nature

Ian Scoones and Robert Chambers quoted in Scientific American

ODI perspective on Millennium Villages.

Sources

Millennium Villages Project

MDG task force on hunger – ‘Halving hunger it can be done’ [Eldis Summary]

Video clip of talk by Jeffrey Sachs and some blog responses

Announcement of $10m of Japanese assistance

Economist – ‘The magnificent seven – how a few simple reforms can lift African villages out of poverty’ [27 April, 2006]

IRIN news report:‘No magic bullets to end poverty, says Jeffrey Sachs’ [22 March 2006]

IFPRI 2020 Focus: Building on Successes in African Agriculture

IDS bulletin/policy briefing: New Directions for African Agriculture

Millennium Villages: Is this at last the solution to African poverty?

Posted on April 14, 2008 by - News

The Millennium Villages project based at the Earth Institute at Columbia University certainly think they have cracked the problem of African poverty and hunger. The solution they suggest is a series of integrated, low cost packages which can be implemented together in a single village cluster setting, and then expanded on a massive scale. The proposed packages costing $75 per person/year involve a set of very familiar options, what the Economist recently dubbed ‘the magnificent seven’. These include, for example, agronomy interventions – notably seed and fertiliser inputs – combined with interventions in health (bed nets), nutrition (school feeding), hydrology (water harvesting and micro-irrigation), information technology (internet access) and so on in an integrated system aimed at tackling the complex problems of poverty and hunger identified in the MDG Hunger Task Force report ‘Halving Hunger: it can be done’.

 

It sounds great. And the prime advocate of the programme, Jeffrey Sachs, tells a convincing story; sufficiently convincing indeed to have raised approaching US$20m from generous philanthropists, foundations, corporations and governments (notably the Japanese), and encouraged the participation at the highest level of 10 countries across Africa in the pilot action research phase. Reviewing the available documentation on the project, however, much of all this seems very familiar. Who, for instance, remembers the experiments in integrated rural development from the 1970s? Who recalls the numerous NGO projects that pumped in resources only to see things falter once the project funding dried up? Is this just old wine in new bottles as some have claimed or something important and new?

Of the 12 initial Millennium villages, across different agro-ecological zones, several are located in the same countries where the Future Agricultures Consortium is working. In Ethiopia, Korano village in the Tigray was chosen, while in Kenya two villages were selected – one in western Kenya (Sauri), the site of past work by Millennium Villages project director Pedro Sanchez, and one in the pastoral north-east (Dertu). In Malawi a ‘hunger hotspot’ area near Zomba was chosen (Mwandama) where, according to the project website, “Earth Institute experts and local farmers worked around the clock in the fall of 2005 to distribute improved seeds and fertilizers to thousands of people in southern Malawi before the November rains came”.

These are all unquestionably poor communities, where the challenge of getting agriculture moving is key to reducing poverty and hunger. But is a concentrated effort focused on a very limited set of villages, with an emphasis largely on technical fixes really the solution? Is not the challenge of improving rural livelihoods in Africa more complex than this? What about institutional issues, politics and governance questions? And what plans are there for coordination of wider infrastructure and market linkages, especially if these cases – as the project advocates repeatedly state – are not to be yet another outside-funded island of success?

As the IDS Bulletin ‘New Directions for African Agriculture’ argued – focusing on the ‘fix’ at the micro-scale is not enough. This may bring important gains for a limited number of people for a limited period, but it is the sustained, long-term benefits of growth spurred by agriculture that is the target. As all the IFPRI studies of success in African agriculture show policies are key – and to get policies right this means attention to the complex arena of African politics. Taking a long-run view these studies showed too that success can be quite ephemeral. Boosts in maize production, for example, occurred in different parts of sub-Saharan Africa for periods when the combination of climate, economics and policy was right, but then the gains, often very suddenly, were lost. And this was not because of the absence of good seed and fertilizer – these have been available for maize at least since the 1950s.

Jeffrey Sachs argues strongly in a recent IRIN news service interview that: “There are no ‘magic bullets’, no single solution that will put an end to global poverty”. So far so good. But Sachs goes on to identify what he calls “quick wins” targeted on “hot spots” which if applied will go a long way to meeting hunger “targets”. The technocratic impulse is, it seems, not far away. Lessons from the past repeatedly suggest that apparently simple technocratic solutions – no matter how integrated, low-cost etc. – do not work in the longer term.

It is for this reason that the Future Agricultures Consortium focuses on the wider policy and institutional conditions for pro-poor agricultural growth, seeing the important priorities of investment – in infrastructure, equipment, skills and expertise – within this broader architecture. What is strikingly absent in the presentation at least of the Millennium Villages project is this wider institutional, political and policy context. Over the coming years, consortium partners in Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi will be hoping to generate a local policy dialogue about future agricultures and appropriate policy solutions at national and local scales. Hopefully this will be a good opportunity to examine the experiences of the Millennium villages and help shape future strategies.

Links


Millennium Villages: Ian Scoones of Future Agricultures quoted in Nature

Ian Scoones and Robert Chambers quoted in Scientific American

ODI perspective on Millennium Villages.

Sources

Millennium Villages Project

MDG task force on hunger – ‘Halving hunger it can be done’ [Eldis Summary]

Video clip of talk by Jeffrey Sachs and some blog responses

Announcement of $10m of Japanese assistance

Economist – ‘The magnificent seven – how a few simple reforms can lift African villages out of poverty’ [27 April, 2006]

IRIN news report:‘No magic bullets to end poverty, says Jeffrey Sachs’ [22 March 2006]

IFPRI 2020 Focus: Building on Successes in African Agriculture

IDS bulletin/policy briefing: New Directions for African Agriculture

Sabine Homann and Barbara Rischkowsky

Posted on April 14, 2008 by - Pastoralism in crisis?

This contribution summarizes insights gained from a case study on the applicability of indigenous knowledge (IK) in range management of Borana pastoralists in a changed environment (Homann, 2004). We reflect on implications for future interventions that aim at improving pastoral livelihoods under the existing constraints.

Borana pastoralists were once famous for most effective range management. Based on a deep technical and organizational IK, they have preserved highest grazing potential among East African rangelands. However, within only 30 years, well intended but poorly designed development interventions (poorly-integrated water and rangeland development, imposed formal administration, promotion of crop cultivation and ranching, unfavorable policy directives), aggravated by human population growth, contributed to the destruction of pastoralists’ basic preconditions in range management.

In the current land use scenario, uncontrolled land use is expanding, since indigenous rangeland categories have lost their functionality. The seasonal grazing system is breaking up, including long distance movements associated with a high variability in stocking densities across the landscape. Instead, encampments, permanent grazing and new forms of cultivation and private grazing enter formerly seasonal grazing areas, and herd movements become short-term oriented to follow scattered forage resources where they emerge. Reduced and poorly coordinated mobility impedes the ecologically desirable variability in stocking densities, implying negative effects on rangeland condition. A crucial question is what elements of pastoral range management remain, that can sustain controlled rangeland utilization, and revert rangeland degradation in this process.

The following changes reflect the deterioration of the pastoral system and need to be addressed by interventions that aim at improving the livelihoods for pastoralists:
– Rangeland degradation: Borana pastoralists’ perception of land use changes matched with the results from ecological range condition assessment (Dalle, 2004). According to pastoralists’ observations, an increased grazing pressure in areas that were formerly temporarily used by mobile herds causes shortage of grazing resources particularly at home-based pastures for lactating herds, aggravated by the alienation of rangeland for crop-cultivation and private grazing. Pastoralists’ observed a direct impact of degraded rangelands on reduced milk production and conception rates. They showed awareness that rangeland degradation directly affects livestock production and presents a high risk for food security in the region. Research and Development efforts to prevent rangeland degradation however had a very low impact (Coppock, 1994).
– Human population growth and socio-economic inequality: Human population growth, despite higher stocking densities, contributed to impoverishment of Borana families evident in lower cattle to human ratio. Within the studied areas, 88% of the households did not achieve the human support capacity defined as 3 TLU per AAME, and thus cannot sustain their livelihoods from livestock (Sandford and Habtu, 2000). In addition to that, socio-economic inequality within and between pastoral communities increased. In Dida Hara, site with water development in a former rainy season grazing area, 6% of the households were classified as better-off and owned over 37 times more cattle than the poor. While in Web, traditional dry season grazing area, all households were poor. The insufficient economic capacities restrict herd mobility for the majority of Borana pastoralists. To alleviate their economically disastrous situation, Borana pastoralists have tried to adopt crop cultivation. Poverty induced crop cultivation however undermines the ecologically more appropriate mobility-based land use system. On the other side, wealthy herd-owners started acting against the interests of the community, by over-stocking the communal rangelands, and stabilizing their property through rapid re-investment in herds after a drought. Considering the fact that alternative income options for Borana pastoralists are few, the dependency on livestock is very high and this destroys pastoralists ability to manage their resources sustainably.
– Erosion of indigenous institutions and negotiation procedures: Imposed administration structures have jeopardized the flexible system of natural resource management and therewith the ability to adapt organization and management structures to changing environment, making use of IK. On the other hand, pastoral communities have transferred proven elements in the indigenous management system to regain control over rangeland utilization; e.g. the allocation of water management responsibilities to newly constructed ponds; the re-strengthening of settlement directives to restrict crop cultivation, private grazing and livestock numbers in permanent grazing areas; the initiative to involve the formal administration in the enforcement of decisions at community level, despite strong deficiencies and distrust. These examples demonstrate pastoralists’ institutions that operate effectively, if community-based mechanisms for co-ordination and control are maintained.

The results basically support Sandfords’ pessimistic prognoses, that reinstating pastoral range management is becoming increasingly difficult. The exploitation rate of the Borana rangelands has been heavily increased. A higher number of poor households depend on Borana rangelands, but not in a position to apply pastoral range management, resulting in higher grazing pressure on rangelands that are effectively shrinking. The negative prospects are aggravated by poorly integrated agriculture, not addressing the possibilities in increasing feed and fodder production, and limited livelihood options out of pastoralism. Without substantial support in migration out of pastoralism and to those who can apply herd mobility, Borana rangelands are going to further deteriorate.

Yet, the possibilities of building on herd mobility for more effective utilization of Borana rangelands are not sufficiently exploited. On the positive side, pastoralists have transferred elements of indigenous organization to the changing environmental conditions, and some indigenous networks persisted. Multi-stakeholder discussions at a final stage of the study advocated land use scenarios for restructuring mobile range management, backed up by integrated IK-based and formal institutions. The need for land-use intensification was acknowledged, preserving basic precondition for mobility and also improving access to marginal rangeland resources. The way forward therefore is to invest in herd mobility and related practices, and control over rangeland resource use by those who remain in pastoralism.

Backgrounder

Posted on April 11, 2008 by - Cereal Seed Systems

As calls for a ‘Uniquely African Green Revolution’ gain momentum, the focus on seeds and seed systems is rising up the policy agenda. Much of the debate emphasises the technological or market dimensions, with substantial investments being made in seed improvement and the development of both public and private sector delivery systems. But there is currently much less emphasis on the wider policy dimensions – and particularly the political economy of policymaking in diverse African contexts.

Experience tells us that it is these factors that often make or break even the best designed and most well intentioned intervention. And since investment in seed improvement and supply was last emphasised as a major development priority (in the 1970s and 80s), contexts have changed. The collapse of national public sector breeding systems has been dramatic, and this has only been selectively compensated for by the entry of the private sector. Large multinational seed and agricultural supply companies are increasingly dominating the global scene, and there are many claims made about the promises of new technologies (notably transgenics) transforming the seed sector through a technological revolution. While informal breeding and seed supply systems continue to exist, and indeed have been extensively supported through NGO and other projects, they are often under pressure, as drought, corruption and conflict take their toll and economic transformation and livelihood change continues apace.

This Future Agricultures project will explore the political economy of cereal seed systems across five countries – the core FAC countries of Ethiopia, Kenya and Malawi, as well as Ghana and Zimbabwe for a wider comparison. Each country has a very different history of research and development in this area; in each setting the importance of the public or the private sector differs, with different actors and interests involved; each country has a different reliance on ‘modern’ hybrid (or sometimes biotech) varieties and associated R and D and supply systems; and each country has a different form and extent of independent informal sector, involving networks of farmer experimenters and seed bulkers and suppliers.

The focus on cereal seed systems allows the research to concentrate on a similar set of crops across the four study countries with a key influence on food security at household and national levels. Given the political reverberations of the ‘food crisis’ of 2007-08, this allows for a timely analysis of the implications of the policy processes shaping the breeding, production, marketing and distribution of cereal seeds. Whether grown for local subsistence or traded commercially, the significance of cereal crops to national politics (and so arguments about food security and sovereignty), commercial interests and local livelihoods – is likely to be profound.

Approach

Overall, an historical approach will be necessary to trace changes in the way policies have been framed, looking at the shifts in narratives about what the problem is and what should be done about it over time. Changes in the configuration of actors, their networks and associated interests will also help illuminate how contemporary policies have emerged. A basic mapping of the current situation will take place, involving interviews with key players (from government policymakers to public/private, national/international researchers to commercial sector seed suppliers and traders to farmers in different parts of the country and with different resource endowments).

This will allow the research to elaborate, first, the set of ‘narratives’ (stories about the problems and the appropriate solutions) being deployed by different people. Second, the way such actors interact and relate will be mapped, highlighting key gaps and connections. Third, the interests of different groupings will be analysed, looking at the competing power relations involved, and asking who wins, and who loses in policy formulation and its implementation. Finally, areas of contention and debate will be identified for each country setting, highlighting areas for institutional and policy development (for example, around issues of regulation, certification, priority setting and so on).

This work will be developed further at a planning workshop to be held at IDS in July 2009. A literature review and compilation of documentation is on-going. The first phase studies will be carried out until March 2010, and will be presented att the Future Agricultures annual meeting which will be held around the Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development in Montpellier, France. At this stage plans for follow on work will be defined, based on key areas/themes identified in the first phase studies.

Points of View

Posted on April 11, 2008 by - 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

Posted on April 1, 2008 by - 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.

CAADP Review And Partnership Platform Meeting (March 17-20, 2008)

Posted on April 1, 2008 by - CAADP

{jathumbnail off}Platform_MeetingThe Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) is an AUC/NEPAD initiative designed to encourage investment in key areas (pillars) that can make the earliest difference to Africa’s agricultural crises. CAADP was adopted by the Head of States as a framework for the revival of agriculture and officially launched in 2003 at a meeting held in Midrand, South Africa.

CAADP aims to be the main tool for cutting hunger and poverty in half in by the year 2015: millennium development goal number 1.

In order to achieve this goal, CAADP asks African countries to commit to:

  • 10% of Budget to agriculture
  • 6% sectoral growth up to 2015
  • Dedicated implementation & monitoring mechanism.

To what extent have countries come on board and adhered to these principles? The principal purpose of the CAADP periodic review and partnership platform meeting is to assess this situation.

This report is concerned with the third review meeting held in the Republic of Seychelles. Section 2 provides progress of the pillars and countries towards compact. Section 3 identifies the role for Future Agricultures in engagement with CAADP. Section 4 is conclusion and recommendation.

icon CAADP Review And Partnership Platform Meeting (March 17-20, 2008) (320.78 kB)

Rising Food Prices: A global crisis

Posted on April 1, 2008 by - News

Soaring 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.

CAADP Review And Partnership Platform Meeting (March 17-20, 2008)

Posted on March 17, 2008 by - Conference Publications

By Amdissa Teshome

The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) is an AUC/NEPAD initiative designed to encourage investment in key areas (pillars) that can make the earliest difference to Africa’s agricultural crises. CAADP was adopted by the Head of States as a framework for the revival of agriculture and officially launched in 2003 at a meeting held in Midrand, South Africa

Evaluation of the 2006/7 Agricultural Input Subsidy Programme, Malawi: Final Report

Posted on March 12, 2008 by - 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.

Cadres politiques propices à l’amélioration de la fertilité des sols en Afrique

Posted on March 5, 2008 by - Briefings politiques / Policy briefs in French

Chacun convient du fait que l’une des composantes centrales, pour parvenir à une « révolution verte africaine », porte sur la nécessaire résolution des problèmes majeurs de fertilité des sols qui pèsent sur l’agriculture africaine. A cet effet, l’AGRA (Alliance pour une révolution verte en Afrique) a lancé un nouveau programme de grande envergure, baptisé « Soil Health » (fertilité des sols) et concernant 4,1 millions d’agriculteurs en Afrique, ceci avec le soutien de la Fondation Bill and Melinda Gates, dont la contribution s’élève à 198 millions de dollars (www.agra-alliance.org/section/work/soils). La déclaration d’Abuja, en conclusion du sommet de l’Afrique sur les engrais qui s’est tenu en 2006, a instauré un contexte propice à des investissements majeurs visant à stimuler l’approvisionnement en engrais (www.africafertilizersummit.org/Abuja Fertilizer Declaration in French.pdf). Le CAADP (Programme global de développement de l’agriculture africaine) a joué un rôle actif dans le cadre des activités de suivi du sommet, notamment par son travail sur l’amélioration des marchés et des échanges (www.triomedia.co.za/work/nepad/newsletters/2008/issue212_15Feb2008.html#toc1 ). On recense par ailleurs de nombreuses autres initiatives, notamment le programme Villages du millénaire (www.millenniumvillages.org/ ), le programme Sasakawa-Global 2000 (www.saa-tokyo.org/french/sg2000/), ainsi que les activités de l’Association for Better Land Husbandry (Association pour une meilleure utilisation des terres d’élevage). Toutes ces initiatives considèrent la fertilité des sols comme une question centrale, même si les solutions et conditions politiques suggérées sont très différentes les unes des autres.

Commercialisation of Smallholder Agriculture in Selected Tef-growing Areas of Ethiopia

Posted on March 2, 2008 by - Discussion Papers

By Samuel Gebreselassie and Kay Sharp

The poverty-reduction strategy adopted by Ethiopia seeks to achieve growth through the commercialisation of smallholder agriculture. The Plan for Accelerated and Sustainable Development to End Poverty (PASDEP), Ethiopia?s strategic framework for 2005/06 – 2009/10, relies on a massive push to accelerate growth. This is to be achieved by efforts in two directions: commercialisation of agriculture, based on supporting the intensification of marketable farm products (both for domestic and export markets, and by both small and large farmers); and promoting much more rapid non-farm private sector growth (MoFED, 2005). This study aims to contribute to this plan by identifying factors that can deepen and expand the scope of market participation of smallholders.

Evaluation of the 2006/7 Agricultural Input Subsidy Programme, Malawi: Final Report

Posted on March 1, 2008 by - News

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.

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

Posted on March 1, 2008 by - Research Papers

By Lidia Cabral and Ian Scoones
March 2006

Much 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 way things should be, rather than the way they are, or are likely to be.

Malawi’s Agriculture Ministry: Fit for Purpose?

Posted on February 6, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 23
By Blessings Chinsinga and Lídia Cabral
February 2008

Malawi’s Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) has a mandate to promote and accelerate broad-based and sustainable agricultural development, so as to stimulate economic growth and contribute to poverty reduction. The MoA is responsible for policy formulation and regulation, the coordination of training and collaboration with other stakeholders in the agriculture sector, and supervision of parastatal organisations, for which it also guarantees loans.

The Malawi Fertiliser Subsidy Programme: politics and pragmatism

Posted on February 5, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 22
By Blessings Chinsinga
January 2006

Many people hoped that the end of one-party rule in Malawi in May 1994 would pave the way for economic recovery and social development. Instead, however, the democratisation process has coincided with a deepening crisis in Malawi’s agricultural sector. Between the 1970s and the 1990s, the country went from producing an agricultural surplus to a substantial food deficit. Per capita maize production fell significantly during the 1990s.

Smallholder Coffee Commercialisation in Malawi

Posted on February 4, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 21
By Ephraim Chirwa, Andrew Dorward and Jonathan Kydd
February 2008

Coffee cultivation in Malawi is dominated by a small number of large-scale commercial estates, located mainly in the Southern region. In the Northern and Central regions, however, coffee is grown predominantly by large numbers of smallholder farmers on customary land, concentrated in the districts of Chitipa, Rumphi, Mzimba and Nkhata-Bay.

The Politics of Policy Reforms in Kenya’s Dairy Sector

Posted on February 2, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 19
By Rosemary Atieno and Karuti Kanyinga
Febuary 2008

Recent reforms of Kenya’s dairy sector have been hailed as a long-term success story. This paper discusses the strengths and limits of Kenya’s dairy sector reforms and identifies some lessons to be drawn from its experience.

La politique de protection sociale au Malawi : processus, politiques et défis

Posted on February 1, 2008 by - Briefings politiques / Policy briefs in French

Les moyens d’existence des Malawites sont probablement beaucoup plus précaires aujourd’hui qu’il y a deux décennies.Les crises répétées sur plusieurs années ont contraint la plupart des foyers à abandonner leurs principaux actifs de production afin de répondre à leurs besoins immédiats, les empêchant de conserver des moyens de subsistance durables.

Le ministère de l’Agriculture au Malawi remplit-il bien sa mission ?

Posted on February 1, 2008 by - Briefings politiques / Policy briefs in French

La mission du Ministère de l’Agriculture (MdA) est de promouvoir et d’accélérer un développement agricole diversifié et durable, pour stimuler la croissance économique et contribuer à la réduction de la pauvreté. Le MdA est chargé de promulguer des lois, de réguler les affaires agricoles, coordonner la formation, et collaborer avec les autres dépositaires d’enjeux du secteur ; il supervise aussi les organismes paragouvernementaux auxquels il accorde des prêts.

The Revitalisation of Kenya Cooperative Creameries

Posted on February 1, 2008 by - Research Papers

Rosemary Atieno and Karuti Kanyinga
February 2008

This paper presents a case study of politics of policy reforms in the dairy sector in Kenya with particular reference to the Kenya Cooperative Creameries (KCC). It is developed for the Policy Processes sub theme of the Future Agricultures Consortium (FAC).

The sub theme recognises that that while many policy recommendations on how to get agriculture moving have been made, too often such recommendations have foundered. This has been attributed to among other things, the narrow focus on the technical dimensions of policy, with little attention paid to the political economy and the complex politics of policy making in specific contexts (FAC 2007).

Rethinking Agricultural Input Subsidies in Poor Rural Economies

Posted on February 1, 2008 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 18
By Andrew Dorward, Peter Hazell and Colin Poulton
February 2008

Agricultural 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 over-spending and fiscal and macro-economic problems.

Mid Term Review Future Agricultures Consortium

Posted on November 1, 2007 by - 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

Posted on October 31, 2007 by - Workshop Publications

Early 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.

FAC Meetings Series, Autumn 2007

Posted on October 1, 2007 by - 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

Posted on October 1, 2007 by - 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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Les commercialisations agricoles: les conditions égales pour les petits exploitants agricoles ?

Posted on October 1, 2007 by - Briefings politiques / Policy briefs in French

La croissance accélérée de l’agriculture est considérée par beaucoup comme déterminante pour répondre aux OMD en Afrique. Pour de nombreux gouvernements nationaux et associations internationales de développement, l’intensification et la commercialisation de l’agriculture paysanne jouent un rôle déterminant dans la réduction de la pauvreté. Les avantages potentiels de la commercialisation sont très bien documentés. Selon ce courant de pensée, l’agriculture paysanne a une position unique pour assurer une croissance à large assise dans les zones rurales où la plus grande majorité de la population pauvre mondiale vit toujours.

Agricultural Commercialisations – A Level Playing Field for Smallholders?

Posted on October 1, 2007 by - Policy Briefs

Policy Brief 17
By Jennifer Leavy and Colin Poulton

Accelerated 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 benefits 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.

Agricultural Commercialisations

Posted on September 24, 2007 by - 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.

Commercialisations in Agriculture

Posted on September 24, 2007 by - Research Papers

By Jennifer Leavy and Colin Poulton

Accelerated growth in agriculture is seen by many as critical if the MDGs are to be met in Africa. Although there are debates about the future viability of small farms (Hazell et al. 2007), the official policies of many national governments and international development agencies accord a central role to the intensification and commercialisation of smallholder agriculture as a means of achieving poverty reduction. 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 still live). However, others fear that strategies for commercialising agriculture will not bring benefits to the majority of 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, the top minority of smallholders will be able to benefit.

The Social Protection Policy in Malawi: Processes, Politics and Challenges

Posted on September 2, 2007 by - Discussion Papers

By Blessings Chinsinga
September 2007

This paper is based on a study undertaken to critically understand the dynamics of policy-making and processes under the auspices of the Future Agricultures Consortium’s (FAC) sub-theme on politics and policy processes hosted by the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) in the United Kingdom. FAC’s operative philosophy is that contrary to the traditional and highly stylised perspective, policy-making does not happen in neat distinct stages except perhaps in the minimal sense that policies are proposed, legislated and implemented. Policy processes are thus a complex mesh of interactions and ramifications between a wide range of stakeholders driven, and constrained by the contexts in which they operate (cf. IDS, 2006; Oya, 2006). Understanding the policy processes therefore requires:

  1. Grasping the narratives that tell the policy stories
  2. The way positions become embedded in networks of various actors; and
  3. The enabling or constraining power dynamics (politics and interests)

Rethinking Agricultural Input Subsidies in Poor Rural Economies

Posted on September 2, 2007 by - Discussion Papers

By Andrew Dorward, Peter Hazell and Colin Poulton

Agricultural input subsidies were a common element in agricultural development in poor rural economies in the 1960s and 70s, and were a common element of successful green revolutions. Although they have continued to a greater and lesser extent in some countries, conventional wisdom and dominant donor thinking in the 80s and 90s was that subsidies had been ineffective and inefficient policy instruments in Africa and contributors to government over-spending and fiscal and macro-economic problems. Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in agricultural input subsidies in Africa and the complementary emergence of innovative subsidy delivery systems. These developments, together with new insights into development processes, require a revisiting of the conventional wisdom on subsidies: an examination of the various development opportunities and constraints facing African farmers, a review of recent experience with input subsidies in Africa, and a thorough re-examination of contributions and implementation modalities of agricultural input subsidies in the Asian green revolution.

The Social Protection Policy in Malawi: Processes, Politics and Challenges

Posted on September 1, 2007 by - Discussion Papers

By Blessings Chinsinga
September 2007

 

This paper is based on a study undertaken to critically understand the dynamics of policy-making and processes under the auspices of the Future Agricultures Consortiums. (FAC) sub-theme on politics and policy processes hosted by the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) in the United Kingdom. FAC.s operative philosophy is that contrary to the traditional and highly stylized perspective, policy making does not happen in neat distinct stages except perhaps in the minimal sense that policies are proposed, legislated and implemented.

Policy processes are thus a complex mesh of interactions and ramifications between a wide range of stakeholders driven, and constrained by the contexts in which they operate (cf. IDS, 2006; Oya, 2006). Understanding the policy processes therefore requires:

1) grasping the narratives that tell the policy stories;

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

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

The decision to study the social protection policy processes was inspired by the guarded optimism among stakeholders about the prospects of formulating a viable social protection policy as compared to the fertilizer subsidy policy programme which is generally orchestrated as a success story. It appears, however, that the differences between these two policy processes are largely due to the factthat the social protection policy deals with issues that are not as visible to the public eye and aspolitically sensitive as the issue of fertilizer popularly perceived as the magic wand to the enduring problem food insecurity. Moreover, the fertilizer subsidy programme is/was a political podium policy while social protection is a technocratically driven policy.

This is to say that fertilizer subsidy issues featured prominently in the 2004 electoral campaign whereas issues of social protection merely lurked at the background except, of course, with occasional vague references to the poverty reduction agenda. References to the poverty reduction agenda were made but often without articulating concrete plans of action to deal with the acute depth and breadth of poverty and vulnerability in the country. It comes therefore not as a surprise that unlike the fertilizer subsidy policy processes, the social protection policy processes are almost entirely divorced from the locus of real decision making.

The key building blocks of the fertilizer subsidy programme were debated and decided on in parliament. In a plural political dispensation parliament is designated as a functionally more appropriate arena for policy debates and dialogue since it brings together political parties representing various shades of opinion from different segments of society. Consequently, by occupying centre in the national legislature, the events leading to the conclusion and adoption of the fertilizer subsidy programme generated a national wide debate and dialogue. In sharp contrast, the social protection policy is nearing completion but a national wide debate and dialogue is virtually non-existent. The fertilizer subsidy programme was a regular feature in the major media outlets but there is almost a complete black out on media coverage about social protection.{jcomments off} 

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Rethinking Agricultural Input in poor Rural Economies

Posted on September 1, 2007 by - Discussion Papers

By Andrew Dorward, Peter Hazell and Colin Poulton
September 2007

As part of discussions on the future of pastoral production systems in East Africa there have been a number of recent interventions arguing that something urgently needs to be done to deal with a Malthusian style crisis in pastoral areas. In short, the argument goes, there are too many people which, combined with a declining (or not increasing) productivity of the natural resource base, means that not enough livestock can be kept to sustain a viable pastoral system.

This argument has been most eloquently and effectively argued by Stephen Sandford in “Too many people,too few livestock: the crisis affecting pastoralists in the Greater Horn of Africa”. This is a response to this piece, aimed at sparking a wider discussion.Such a discussion is urgently needed. For at the same time as the pessimistic prognoses about pastoralist futures in the Greater Horn of Africa, there has been, for the first time in several decades, a revival of interest in pastoralism and livestock production.

This takes two forms – one a celebration of the ‘pastoral way of life’ and the importance of indigenous systems of production and management1 and another focusing on the market potentials of a ‘livestock revolution’2. What should we make of these positions? What should the practical and policy responses be? Pastoral pessimism?
The arguments of Sandford (and others) put the more up-beat assessments in doubt. What are some of the major elements of the pastoral pessimists’ argument?

1. That people:livestock ratios have declined in pastoralist households to a levelbelow 3 TLUs/person, deemed to be a ‘viable’ amount for sustainablelivestock production, due to a combination of human population growth anddeclining rainfall.

2. That primary and secondary productivity (through range management,veterinary and other interventions) are not sufficient to make up the gap, andare unlikely to be so in the future.

3. That real prices of livestock products have not increased (and are unlikely to do so, despite growing demand) to compensate for lower numbers per household.

4. That, with small and decreasing herd/flock sizes, sales remain focused on immediate cash needs rather than ‘commercial’ off take.

5. That pastoral economies remain poor, associated with limited circulation of cash, and so have little opportunity for growth through linkages to other income earning activities.

6. That land for grazing and livestock production continues to be removed for cropping, and that this, particularly if supported by irrigation, is probably a better bet for many pastoralists anyway.

7. That for many the best option is exit, but in a way that does not involve destitution and displacement.

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Resurrecting the Vestiges of a Developmental State in Malawi? Reflections and Lessons

Posted on August 22, 2007 by - Research Papers

Blessings Chinsinga
August 2007

Malawi has experienced two distinct phases of development (although sub-phases can between be distinguished, especially in the second phase). The first phase spanned from the attainment of independence in July 1964 to the end of the 1970s, whilst the second phase began with the adoption of structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) in 1981 (cf. Chipeta, 1993; Chirwa, 1997; Harrigan, 2001; Chinsinga, 2002). The 1964–1979 period saw the country?s economy registering very high growth rates and enjoyed relatively favourable balance of payment positions. Almost every sector experienced tremendously rapid growth to the extent that the country was characterized at one point, alongside the Ivory Coast, as a star performer (cf. Archaya, 1978; World Bank, 1982). In stark contrast, the post-1979 phase witnessed almost every sector of the economy experiencing a stupendous decline, followed by persistently erratic recovery trends of boom-and-bust type patterns (cf. Kaluwa, et al., 1992; Chirwa, 1995; Chilowa, et al., 2000).

Synthesis Report for Theme III. Growth and Social Protection

Posted on August 12, 2007 by - Miscelleanous

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 livelihoodsof poor and vulnerable people, in local and national economies, and in policy formulation and implementation.

Using Social Protection Policies to Reduce Vulnerability and Promote Economic Growth in Kenya

Posted on August 1, 2007 by - Discussion Papers

Economic_Growth_in_KenyaBy John Omiti and Timothy Nyanamba
August 2007

Vulnerability and human suffering are major challenges facing large sections of Kenyan society who depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Policy reforms have failed to adequately address social protection issues afflicting particularly the most vulnerable groups.

 

This paper discusses ways in which social protection policies can be used to address the key sources or aspects of this vulnerability, and to promote agricultural and economic growth. The paper reviews social protection instruments, maps out actors involved in the provision of social protection, assesses the progress in provision of social protection in Kenya and identifies issues in moving forward to improve social protection, particularly in the agriculture sector.

Broad categories of social protection instruments – including social safety nets and social security are discussed. Issues regarding to targeting as well as instruments that can be used to deliver social protection programmes in agriculture are outlined. This is intended to promote further policy discourse in the area of social protection in Kenya and other comparable countries.

In the existing social protection programmes in the country, weak coordination, overlaps, supervision and monitoring of the multi-sectoral programmes is a recognised cause for concern. To address social protection effectively, policies must embrace both economic growth and its distribution. There is a need to sensitise relevant government functionaries and other stakeholders to basic social protection and propose ways that could contribute to the sustainable financing of some social protection programmes for agricultural and general economic growth.

There is an urgent need for an approach to concentrate resources, to define roles and responsibilities, and facilitate coordination between different parts of government, United Nations agencies, non-governmental and civil society organizations (NGOs and CSOs). Sustainability of the target programmes would be enhanced by participation and ownership by the concerned community.

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Lessons from Malawi’s 2005/2006 Fertilizer Subsidy Programme

Posted on July 1, 2007 by - 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.

Bottom Up Policy Process: An agenda for Future Agricultures in Ethiopia

Posted on June 23, 2007 by - Media

A number of observers have described the policy making process in Ethiopia asstrongly influenced by a long history of centralised, hierarchical systems of control under Imperial rule and nearly two decades of military rule by the Derg. The present government has made efforts to reverse this legacy however,“in spite of significant political, administrative and financialdecentralisation, the centralised and controlling legacy remains an important factor”.

According to this observation, it is not easy to overcome a legacy in a short period of time. Future Agricultures, a learning consortium of local and international academics and researchers, has developed and tested an all inclusive policy consultation process that, if scaled up, could change the top down legacy. In the process of testing the model, indicative ideas for agricultural policy making have been generated.