The purpose of this report is to assess the efficiency of the Ethiopian grain marketing system and identify some of the constraints on market participants which influence its performance. The main questions dealt with are: How is the grain marketing system organized and coordinated? Is the grain...

This paper aims to summarize the rationale and objectives of the Crop Marketing Authority and the possible consequences of adopting the proposed legislation. We also identify where the proposal, in its current form, requires additional specificity in order to evaluate its ability to meet...

The paper consists of three parts. The first part of the paper is a review of agricultural performance in Ethiopia over the past forty years. The second part diagnoses agricultural system performance and food security problems in Ethiopia and discusses some tentative practical strategies for...

The paper has several specific objectives. First, it identifies how fertilizer marketing costs and the types of fertilizers used have changed over the course of the liberalization process in Kenya. A second objective is to examine the fertilizer subsector in Kenya with a view to identifying...

This report provides an initial assessment of the impact of agricultural commodity taxes levied by local district authorities on the national objectives of food security, poverty alleviation and economic growth. A study was undertaken to provide government with a better understanding of the...

The objective of this report is to review available evidence on the potential to promote access to food for vulnerable groups in Ethiopia through two main methods: food transfer programs, and appropriate policies influencing the food marketing system. These issues are examined with a view to...

Prepared for the COMESA policy seminar on “Variation in staple food prices: Causes, consequence, and policy options”, Maputo, Mozambique, 25-26 January 2010 under the Comesa-MSU-IFPRI African Agricultural Marketing Project (AAMP)

Using comprehensive rural farm household longitudinal data from Zambia, this paper measures the impacts of prime-age (PA) adult morbidity and mortality on crop production and cropping patterns, household size, livestock and non-farm income. The paper adopts and extends the counterfactual...

The rapid increase in adult mortality due to the AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa raises great concern about potential intergenerational effects on children. This article estimates the impact of AIDS-related adult mortality on primary school attendance in rural Kenya using a panel of 1,266...

The ability of agricultural policy makers to promote national development objectives requires an accurate and reasonably current picture of what crops farmers grow, what they eat, the importance of various crops in their incomes, and how they spend their money. In Zambia’s case, there is...