Fisheries play an important part in the economic and social life of people in Burundi. One third of the animal protein consumption in the country stems from fisheries, and the sector employs over 100,000 people. Yet, about 10 to 15% of the harvest is lost in the process. Fish drying,...

Lors de la 28ème session de la Conférence Régionale de la FAO pour l’Afrique tenue à Tunis du 24 au 28 mars 2014, les hauts dirigeants des gouvernements africains ont manifesté le rôle primordial que les petits exploitants agricoles jouent dans la lutte pour éradiquer la faim et la malnutrition...

This Report presents the results of the 2011-2012 Agriculture and Livestock Survey (ALS) in Small Scale Commercial farms (SSCF) conducted by the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency.

Farming in Nigeria largely takes place in peasant and small scale physical labour-fed farms where productivity diminishes with age. Given depleting productivity accounted for by loss of agility due to advancement in age and general insufficiency of capital, avenues capable of sufficiently salvaging this dearth must, therefore, be explored. The...

Using the case of maize production in Kenya, this study reframes the challenge of smallholder commercialization in the context of staplefood crop production and individual farm-level decision-making by a heterogeneous population of smallholder farmers. Whilemany smallholder growers of staple crops find themselves trapped in a cycle of poverty, they differ greatly in their...

Successful commercialization of farming enterprises and farmer entrepreneurship are thought to embody the key features of structural transformation and provide a pathway out of poverty and subsistence agriculture for the rural farm households. The past decade has seen several African countries increase their agricultural growth, largely driven by increases in...

Agriculture plays a significant role in Africa, accounting for about 30 per cent of GDP south of the Sahara, as well as a significant proportion of export value. Not surprisingly, in most African countries, 60 per cent or more of employees work in agriculture. Yet this barely scrapes the surface...

Family farming offers solutions to global challenges. More than 500 million family farms dominate agriculture – ensuring food security, fighting poverty and hunger, providing employment, and enhancing sustainable resource management. Despite challenges, family farms can become prosperous businesses. Forming part of CTA’s support to the UN International Year of Family...

L'agriculture familiale présente des solutions aux défis mondiaux. Plus de 500 millions de fermes familiales dominent l'agriculture : elles permettent d'assurer la sécurité alimentaire, de lutter contre la pauvreté et la famine, de fournir des emplois et d'améliorer la gestion des ressources durables. Même si elles ont des défis à...

This publication draws from reports and notes from a series of events in the International Year of Family Farming: Regional Dialogues on Family Farming were organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization in collaboration with the World Rural Forum, the International Cooperative Alliance and the World Farmers Organization to increase the understanding of the family farming context in each region,and...

The Ethiopian government’s Agricultural Development Led Industrialization strategy emphasises the instrumental role that rural youth could play in transforming the agricultural sector. However, there exists a significant body of literature documenting the unfavourable attitudes many young people hold towards a future in agriculture. Despite their negative attitudes, the fact remains...

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), pigs are raised almost exclusively by smallholders either in periurban areas of major cities such as Kinshasa or in rural villages. Unfortunately, little information is available regarding pig production in the Western part of the DRC, wherefore a survey was carried out...

Poverty and vulnerability combine in a vicious circle for many family farmers. To break that and turn it into a virtuous cycle, resilience must be built into farming and the systems in which farmers operate. There is an urgent need for a change in mindset regarding family farming, agriculture and...

A large proportion of Malawian households are caught in a trap where poverty and food insecurity reinforce one another and where periods of food deficits and severe food crises are frequent occurrences. In recognition of this, the Malawian government has since 2005/06 implemented a large-scale Farm Input Subsidy Program (FISP),...

Présentation de la ferme école BENKADI BUGU près de Ségou au Mali. Un environnement social et commercial sur 10 ha. Chaque année, 20 jeunes ruraux, garçons et filles,  participent et acquièrent un enseignement en agroécologie en alternance qu’ils appliquent en même temps sur leur propre parcelle. De plus, les apprenants...

Child labour is work that interferes with compulsory schooling or damages children’s health and personal development. Thanks to continuous efforts at the international and local level, recent global data,1 show that the number of children engaged in child labour worldwide has significantly declined from 215 to 168 million children (40 percent decline...

The purpose of this study was to estimate the impact of minimum tillage and crop rotation on maize yields and incomes for farmers adopting the strategies. The study used cross sectional data collected in 2012/13 from 1231 households across six districts of Zambia and applied propensity score matching techniques and...

During the 2012/2013 agricultural season, The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) implemented a market-based agriculture input assistance programme in Zimbabwe. FAO together with key partners aimed at reducing poverty and food insecurity in Zimbabwe, by helping to increase the productivity and income of small-scale farmers as...

FAO project to introduce simple raised drying racks improves livelihoods and nutrition for communities along the shores of Lake Tanganyika and beyond

Drought is one of the most constraining climate extremes to livelihoods particularly in dryland environments. Effective adaptation to drought is partly dependent on farmers’ perceptions and how these are harmonised with scientific knowledge systems into local adaptation policies and strategies. This paper examined the perceptions of drought among farmers in...