Smallholder Market Access

The economic and political context of agricultural activity has undergone profound changes. Market liberalizations, WTO constraints on domestic support policies and regional integration processes, have changed the agricultural marketing system. Price fluctuations for staple food crops are increasingly de-linked from domestic production dynamics and seasonality. Especially, smallholder farmers face the challenge of how to get access to these changing markets. In the face of these changes, one pre-requisite is for farmers to set up and strengthen their economic organisation.

By articulating national farmers’ organisations in developing countries with researchers and consultants, the ESFIM programme will strengthen the capacities of national farmers’ organisations in developing pro-active policy proposals. Proposals that will be adapted to their specific national context, but enriched with the experiences of other farmers’ organisations inside and outside their country.

This ESFIM research and policy development programme focuses on successful and replicable regulatory policies and institutional arrangements that can empower smallholder farmers in markets. It will have the farmers organizations in the driving seat: for identifying research priorities and for learning and reflecting on research outputs. ESFIM will build on the outputs of other research programmes like Regoverning Markets, GFAR – LSFM, and research in the ECART Institutes.