Aflatoxins are more than a barrier to trade for smallholders— they are a serious risk to public health. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 4.5 billion people are chronically exposed to the toxin through the consumption of staple foods, leading to cancer and childhood stunting as...

Large-scale foreign land acquisitions - land grabs - are major and real concerns for African populations.   The consequences of land deals are highly significant for local populations and the environment. Some see economic opportunities for local communities through employment and income generated from leasing or selling land. Others see land...

One direct way in which agricultural input subsidies can provide social protection to the poor is by targeting the poor with very high subsidies to ensure that they are able to access inputs. Although the Malawi Agricultural Input Subsidy Programme (MAISP) generally targets resource-poor households, the targeting guidelines also accord...

The National Smallholder Farmers’ Association of Malawi has used its multi-tiered membership structure to build a ‘knowledge chain’, spreading conservation agriculture techniques to more than 37,000 farmers. Combining this effort with support for adult literacy is empowering farmers (particularly women) to both gain and use new knowledge.

Without financial access and sufficient yearly earnings, many farmers also lose up to 50 percent of their annual potential income because they must gain quick access to cash to afford household expenses all year. In the time leading up to harvest, farmers often experience a “hungry season” in which they...

The Government of Malawi has been promoting the establishment of farmer organisations including cooperatives in an effort to help small-scale farmers improve their income and develop their managerial skills by venturing into a business oriented approach to farming. However, despite the benefits associated with cooperatives, general cooperative membership is still...

There is often a mismatch between the apparent benevolent intents and the practical manifestations of the large scale land deals. The empirical realities of the large-scale land deals call for critical scrutiny and interrogation of the underlying interests of the stakeholders involved to assess the extent to which they genuinely...

This research will evaluate carcass quality and processing potential of goat meat produced by smallholder farmers in Malawi. The farmers will keep local Malawi goat and Norwegian goats under three management systems (intensive, extensive and semi-intensive). The carcasses from these goats will be analyzed for gross and chemical composition. They...

Alice Kachere, a smallholder farmer from Malawi, talks about the challenges she faces as well as the training she has benefited from.

This study quantifies how population density affects input use and output per hectare of staple crops. In doing so, we empirically test Ester Boserup’s (1965) hypothesis that increasing population density leads to agricultural intensification, measured through increased demand for modern inputs, such as commercial fertilizer and increased production per hectare....

This paper investigates the relationship between food security and commercialisation using data from a household survey in National Smallholder Farmer Association of Malawi (NASFAM) operated areas. NASFAM promotes commercialisation of agriculture by introducing the principle of farming as a business among its members who are largely smallholder subsistent farmers. The...

The Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) surveys which have collected information on many dimensions of household well-being for over 36 countries since 1980 are one of the most important data sources for informing policy making on development. The LSMS surveys have been used to assess household welfare, to understand household...

The present ability or otherwise of Africa to cope with climate change and improve its agricultural production depends on the environment and natural resources base of the continent, on the impacts of its past and on the nature of its present interactions with the outside world. Africa is a large...

The Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Programme (CAADP) aims to revitalize African farming in order to reduce rural poverty and hunger. This is a massively important undertaking for a continent where a third of the population continue to struggle with chronic malnutrition. But is CAADP getting the right strategies, policies and...

Agriculture remains an important means of alleviating poverty, but shortage of finance can constrain its development. At the same time, agriculture is evolving towards a global system requiring high-quality, comptetitive products, and is organized in value chains which often exclude smallholders. Value chain financing in agriculture offers an opportunity to...

Producer organisations are widely heralded as leading contributors to poverty reduction and the achievement of food security. Following the withdrawal of state support as part of measures for liberalization, producer organizations in Africa have been in a process of transition, attempting to define appropriate strategies in a competitive open market...

The aim of this research is to raise and provide empirical evidence for promoting tree farming in Malawi. It addresses questions such as: Is tree farming a viable system for small-scale farmers in Malawi? Trees have multiple products for subsistence use and are also a source of income security to...

This first issue after the merger of the old Baobab with the Kilimo Endelevu Africa (KEA) looks at the importance of livestock in the livelihoods of farmers. Livestock is an integral part of most family farms, and fulfills many functions such as food, assets and fertilizer. This issue focuses on...

This issue of Baobab focuses on access to water for sustainable agriculture and livelihoods, its management and policies, or lack of them, which can regulate its effective and efficient use. In a region that highly relies on rainfall for food production, a lot needs to be done in agricultural water...

The paper reports work aimed at improving livelihoods of smallholders by providing investors, policymakers and implementers with concrete knowledge and tools to make informed investment decisions on small-scale irrigation water management interventions. The projects reported assessed promising irrigation interventions and their ‘market potential’, analyzed which technologies ‘fit’ in major agroecological...