Family farms are central to both contemporary changes and contradictions in agriculture. They have been, and are still, the crucible for a whole host of agricultural innovations and major revolutions. They form the social basis of most Southern countries and contribute to supplying their local, national and international markets. Paradoxically, however, they constitute the vast majority of poor rural households which are also in a situation of food insecurity worldwide. They sometimes operate using specialised, and highly artificialised, intensified models (agrochemicals and mechanisation). In this respect, they do not escape the questions and criticism directed to agriculture and its capacity to meet the contemporary and widely globalised challenges of climate change, food security, the increasing scarcity of fossil fuels, and the prevention of emerging diseases. But family farms also provide alternative production models to conventional intensification – sustainable agriculture models or new energy sources – which differentiates them from corporate farms and can bring solutions to the world’s food, social and environmental challenges.

This publication is a resumption and revised version of the report published by CIRAD in May 2013 with the same title, on behalf and at the request of Agence Française de Développement (AFD), the Ministry of Agriculture, Agrifood and Forestry (MAAF) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development (MAEDI). The commission given to CIRAD, which was entitled “Study on the contribution that family farming makes to food security” was intended to prepare the United Nations International Year of Family Farming (2014) and aimed to “clarify the terminology used, the reality covered by family farming in developing countries and its impact on food security and sustainable development”, based on an analysis of the institutional and scientific literature and case studies in various countries concerning the “implementation of family farming policies”.