Livestock is the most important source of cash for small-scale farmers in the semi-arid tropics of southern Africa. However, with limited access to markets, farmers do not have the incentive to invest in improved livestock management. Livestock production and off-takes remain low and farmers are...

Due to the size of the European Union’s agricultural production and its market, the impact of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reaches far beyond Europe and has major implications for trade in agricultural goods all over the world including the ESA region. Since the 1950s, the CAP...

This study is based on data collected from 141 family-type farms in the Yatenga province in Burkina Faso. A probit approach is used to analyze the effect of perception of land degradation and other factors on the adoption of zaï and stone rows. The results of the estimation show that the...

This paper highlights a market information and linkage system (MILS) developed and tested by the Kenya Agricultural Commodity Exchange Limited (KACE) that increases the efficiency of agricultural markets to work better for smallholder farmers and other small and medium sized agro-enterprises...

Striga hermonthica (del) Benth is threatening rural livelihoods in western Kenya where maize is the major food and cash crop. Vulnerability analysis was conducted on a sample of 802 households in eight districts of Nyanza and Western provinces. Farmers perceived Striga as the major cause of...

L’objectif de la présente étude est d’évaluer la diffusion et l’adoption des variétés de riz NERICA en Guinée cinq années après leur introduction. Les données collectées en 2002 sont relatives à 1535 paysans choisis dans 79 villages des quatre régions naturelles de la Guinée....

Face à l'inefficacité et l'inefficience des systèmes de commercialisation en ASS, la présente étude tente d’évaluer les marges commerciales et l’équité du commerce du maïs, du sorgho, du gari, de la tomate, de l’oignon, du poisson et du bétail au Togo. Elle conclut que les...

We assess the level and determinants of relative technical efficiency of maize-based smallholder farmers using a translog stochastic frontier (TL) model and a symmetric generalized Barnett production function (SGB), both of which are tested for economic regularity conditions. In addition, we...

To improve the livelihood of the poor in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) much attention has been paid to the development of new agricultural technologies. We hypothesize that farmers can also improve their livelihood through cooperation. Partial cooperation, in which knowledge is shared or bargaining...

Increasing foreign exchange problems and deteriorating prices of traditional export commodities have led policy makers and donor agencies to seek diversification in export crop production. In Ghana, crops such as pineapples and mangoes appear promising because of their high labour intensity and...