Many people in the vast rural areas of Africa lack access to financial services, and most commercial banks are not interested in moving into these areas due to their low income levels, lack of scale economies, and poor infrastructure. Also, few banks actually understand the most common economic...

Taking successful development interventions to scale is critical if the world is to achieve the Millennium Development Goals and make essential gains in the fight for improved agricultural productivity, rural incomes, and nutrition. How to support scaling up in these three areas, however, is a...

A primary motivation for this study is to identify a key set of policy options for improving fertilizer markets in West Africa (among Economic Community of West African States member countries) in ways that ultimately will help improve the efficiency of regional markets and lower the transaction...

To better inform donor support for public food safety interventions, this paper reviews the literature on the impact of more stringent food safety standards on developing-country markets. This literature has primarily focused on the market access and economic implications of higher standards in...

The rapid expansion of commodity agriculture in tropical forest landscapes is a key driver of deforestation. To meet the growing demand from a more prosperous and expanding global population, it is imperative to develop sustainable commodity supply chains that support higher agricultural...

Rising demands for quality and safety measures in high-value agriculture and livestock markets have necessitated the creation of increasingly complex supply chains to manage the flow of goods and information among channel actors. Public–private partnerships (PPPs) can play a key role in...

"Many developing countries have moved into the production of non-traditional agricultural products to diversify their exports and increase foreign currency earnings. Accessing developed country markets and urban domestic markets requires meeting the food safety requirements due to several demand...

Agriculture is the largest economic sector in most African countries and remains the best opportunity for economic growth and poverty alleviation on the continent. Yet, sadly, the sector has been in decline over the past 40 years, and poor farmers have largely remained poor. This failure is due...

"To improve the ability of farmers in developing countries to reduce the burden of foodborne illness, government agencies need to take the following steps: (1) Implement a farm-to-table approach to agricultural health by focusing efforts on the prevention of potential food safety and...