Smallholder farmers: the new food frontiers

Lazarus Sauti

Southern African Development Community (SADC) member-states face challenges ranging from scarcity or unpredictable changes in food availability due to factors such as weather and climate, labour-intensive or outdated agricultural methods, and HIV and AIDS, and other health issues affecting agricultural production levels.

But it is easier to improve the lives of citizens by removing the serious obstacle of inadequate access to food.

The solution lies with smallholder farmers – the new global food frontiers.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), an agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger, says:

“Smallholder farmers are the backbone of agricultural production in the world, especially the developing countries as four-fifths of the developing world’s food is a product of small-sized farms.

“Smallholder farmers are key to lifting many people out of poverty. They produce nearly 70 per cent of all food consumed worldwide on 60 per cent of the planet’s arable land.”

Officiating at the Third General Assembly of the Korea-Africa Food and Agricultural Initiative in Harare recently, Chief Secretary in the office of the President and Cabinet in Zimbabwe, Dr Misheck Sibanda said: “Smallholder farmers have the potential to increase maize yields if given the necessary support.

“With right inputs and good agricultural practices, productivity at household level can be increased thereby reducing the threat of food security.”

Zimbabwe’s Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development responsible for crop production and mechanisation, Davis Marapira also says smallholder farmers contribute immensely to agricultural production although they do not have enough resources.

“Local and international studies have shown that smallholder farmers contribute immensely to agricultural production, yet they are the least equipped and face a lot of challenges to commercialise their activities,” he said.

Senior African policy makers, who attended a seminar co-hosted by another UN agency, the World Food Programme (WFP) – the food assistance branch of the United Nations and the world’s largest humanitarian organisation addressing hunger and promoting food security, and the African Research Consortium (AERC) – a public non profit organisation devoted to the advancement of economic policy research and training, in Maputo, Mozambique recently agreed that smallholder farmers are central to economic and social transformation.

“Smallholder farmers are central to socio-economic development in African countries as they produce most food that is consumed by many households on the continent,” the policy makers said.

Hugh Locke, co-founder and President at Smallholder Farmers Alliance – Haitian non-profit foundation, however, said that for what sounds like a major part of the global economy, you would expect smallholder farmers to be relatively well off and financially secure, but this is not the case.

These farmers, especially in southern African countries, are faced with lower yields because they lack access to credit facilities as well as market-related information.

“Smallholders farmers in SADC countries are often faced with lower yields not because of lack of vast fields for larger production, but because they have less access to technical knowledge, markets, credit facilities and inputs such as fertilisers and improved seeds,” said Marapira.

Speaking at the USAID-Zimbabwe Agricultural Income and Employment Development (Zim AIDE) project closeout, United States ambassador to Zimbabwe, Bruce Wharton, pointed out that besides their significant contribution, smallholder farmers in most Southern African countries are not receiving as much support in terms of inputs and training on pertinent issues like market surveys.

He said supporting smallholder farmers is of paramount importance if the SADC region is to increase incomes and stamp out poverty, a notion supported by Marapira who added that helping smallholder farmers is central to economic development.

Marapira noted: “Smallholder farmers in Southern Africa are bedeviled with many problems, but addressing these challenges is central to moving towards food security, improved nutrition, increased rural incomes and economic growth.”

He urged governments in the region and national as well as international companies to assist in funding smallholder farmers as well as helping them with market research.

“Appropriate incentives are critical for smallholder farmers to adopt the productivity – and income-enhancing technologies as well as practices that drive agricultural development and broader economic and social transformation.

“As a result, governments, development partners, national and international companies need to assist smallholder farmers in Southern Africa with funding as well as market research,” Marapira said.

Elton Mudyazvivi, agriculture sector leader for SNV Netherlands Development Organisation – a non-profit, international development organisation established to alleviate poverty by enabling increased income and employment opportunities and increasing access to basic services, believes public and private sectors, along with government departments should provide necessary resources to promote good agricultural practices such as organic farming if smallholder farmers are to contribute immensely to social and economic expansion.

“Organic farming is the way to go for Southern African countries. Collectively, the private sector and government departments should provide resources to promote good agricultural practices such as organic farming,” he asserted.

Mudyazvivi added: “The future and sustainability of our agriculture lies in a stable ecosystem; hence, we believe in organic farming as the future for smallholder farmers, where farmers have to sell quality and healthy produce to the market.”

Zimbabwe’s Agriculture minister, Dr Joseph Made, believes irrigation schemes, key drought mitigation measures and vehicles for the long-term agricultural and macro-economic development, can boost smallholder farmers.

“Successful smallholder irrigation schemes can result in increased productivity, improved incomes and nutrition, employment creation, food security and drought relief savings for governments,” noted Dr Made.

He advised that social and economic evaluations of smallholder irrigation schemes are needed at regular intervals in order for SADC countries to be able to derive lessons from past experiences and also help decision-makers in formulating policies and strategies for future development.

Significantly, the needs of women farmers and youth also require special attention since they share the workload on smallholder farms.

Governments and other stakeholders must invest in women and youth and treat them equally.

“When women and youth are included as equals, productivity is likely to go up.

Governments in the region must support and invest in them by ensuring that women and youth get equal access to agricultural training, credit loans and help them set up co-operatives and small businesses to process food into sellable products,” added Locke.  

To be the spine of agriculture in the region, Tichaona Charova, production officer for the Zimbabwe Organic Producers and Promoters Association (ZOPPA) Trust – a national movement that brings together organic producers, promoters and processors for the development of the organic agriculture sector in Zimbabwe, believes training is crucial for smallholder farmers.

Borrowing from author Ann Voskamp’s quote that training is the essence of transformation, Charova said: “Smallholder farmers need training. In this vein, government departments and stakeholder must train them so that they produce healthy products.”

Locke added: “Smallholder farmers need training, better seed, good tools, and access to markets and financing.

“Responding to these needs will have a measurable output in the form of increased yields, but the actual impact will be beyond measure: finding solutions for smallholder farmers means finding solutions that engage one-third of humanity in addressing food security, climate stability, biodiversity conservation and rural employment.”