IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v63y2014icp92-101.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

African Agriculture in 50Years: Smallholders in a Rapidly Changing World?

Author

Listed:
  • Collier, Paul
  • Dercon, Stefan

Abstract

For economic development to succeed in Africa in the next 50years, African agriculture will have to change beyond recognition. Production will have to have increased massively, but also labor productivity, requiring a vast reduction in the proportion of the population engaged in agriculture and a large move out of rural areas. The paper questions how this can be squared with a continuing commitment to smallholder agriculture as the main route for growth in African agriculture and for poverty reduction. We question the evidence base for an exclusive focus on smallholders, and argue for a much more open-minded approach to different modes of production. To allow alternative modes and scale of production to emerge, new institutional and policy frameworks are required. A rush to establish “mega-farms” with government discretionary allocation of vast tracts of land is unlikely to be the answer. Allowing a more dynamic agriculture to develop will require clear institutional frameworks, and not just a narrow focus on smallholders.

Suggested Citation

  • Collier, Paul & Dercon, Stefan, 2014. "African Agriculture in 50Years: Smallholders in a Rapidly Changing World?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 92-101.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:63:y:2014:i:c:p:92-101
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2013.10.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X13002131
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Christiaensen, Luc & Demery, Lionel & Kuhl, Jesper, 2011. "The (evolving) role of agriculture in poverty reduction--An empirical perspective," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 239-254, November.
    2. Barrett, Christopher B. & Bellemare, Marc F. & Hou, Janet Y., 2010. "Reconsidering Conventional Explanations of the Inverse Productivity-Size Relationship," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 88-97, January.
    3. Prabhu Pingali & Yasmeen Khwaja & Madelon Meijer, 2005. "Commercializing Small Farms: Reducing Transaction Costs," Working Papers 05-08, Agricultural and Development Economics Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO - ESA).
    4. Thomas Reardon & C. Peter Timmer & Christopher B. Barrett & Julio Berdegué, 2003. "The Rise of Supermarkets in Africa, Asia, and Latin America," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1140-1146.
    5. Collier Paul & Venables Anthony J., 2012. "Land Deals in Africa: Pioneers and Speculators," Journal of Globalization and Development, De Gruyter, vol. 3(1), pages 1-22, June.
    6. Eswaran, Mukesh & Kotwal, Ashok, 1986. "Access to Capital and Agrarian Production Organisation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 96(382), pages 482-498, June.
    7. Oriana Bandiera & Imran Rasul, 2006. "Social Networks and Technology Adoption in Northern Mozambique," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 116(514), pages 869-902, October.
    8. Bezemer, Dirk & Headey, Derek, 2008. "Agriculture, Development, and Urban Bias," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1342-1364, August.
    9. Gharad Bryan & Shyamal Chowdhury & A. Mushfiq Mobarak, 2011. "Seasonal Migration and Risk Aversion," Working Papers id:4650, eSocialSciences.
    10. Michael Kevane, 1996. "Agrarian Structure and Agricultural Practice: Typology and Application to Western Sudan," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 78(1), pages 236-245.
    11. Allen,Robert C., 2009. "The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521868273, January.
    12. Deininger, Klaus & Byerlee, Derek, 2012. "The Rise of Large Farms in Land Abundant Countries: Do They Have a Future?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 701-714.
    13. van Zyl, Johan & Binswanger, Hans & Thirtle, Colin, 1995. "The relationship between farm size and efficiency in South African agriculture," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1548, The World Bank.
    14. Kimhi, Ayal, 2003. "Plot Size And Maize Productivity In Zambia: The Inverse Relationship Re-Examined," Discussion Papers 14980, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management.
    15. Donald F. Larson & Keijiro Otsuka & Tomoya Matsumoto & Talip Kilic, 2014. "Should African rural development strategies depend on smallholder farms? An exploration of the inverse-productivity hypothesis," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 45(3), pages 355-367, May.
    16. Juliano J. Assunção & Luis H. B. Braido, 2007. "Testing Household-Specific Explanations for the Inverse Productivity Relationship," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 89(4), pages 980-990.
    17. Foster, Andrew D & Rosenzweig, Mark R, 1996. "Technical Change and Human-Capital Returns and Investments: Evidence from the Green Revolution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(4), pages 931-953, September.
    18. de Brauw, Alan & Mueller, Valerie & Lee, Hak Lim, 2014. "The Role of Rural–Urban Migration in the Structural Transformation of Sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 33-42.
    19. Assunção, Juliano & Braido, Luis H.B., 2007. "AJAE Appendix: Testing Household-Specific Explanations for the Inverse Productivity Relationship," American Journal of Agricultural Economics APPENDICES, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 0(Number 4), pages 1-8, November.
    20. Mike Waugh & David Lagakos & Doug Gollin, 2011. "The Agricultural Productivity Gap in Developing Countries," 2011 Meeting Papers 1397, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    21. Zaibet, Lokman T & Dunn, Elizabeth G, 1998. "Land Tenure, Farm Size, and Rural Market Participation in Developing Countries: The Case of the Tunisian Olive Sector," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 46(4), pages 831-848, July.
    22. Diao, Xinshen & Fekadu, Belay & Haggblade, Steven & Seyoum Taffesse, Alemayehu & Wamisho, Kassu & Yu, Bingxin, 2007. "Agricultural growth linkages in Ethiopia: Estimates using fixed and flexible price models," IFPRI discussion papers 695, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    23. Colin Poulton & Jonathan Kydd & Andrew Dorward, 2006. "Overcoming Market Constraints on Pro-Poor Agricultural Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 24(3), pages 243-277, May.
    24. Ravallion, Martin & Chen, Shaohua, 2007. "China's (uneven) progress against poverty," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 1-42, January.
    25. Barrett, Christopher B., 1996. "On price risk and the inverse farm size-productivity relationship," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 193-215, December.
    26. Wiggins, Steve, 2000. "Interpreting Changes from the 1970s to the 1990s in African Agriculture Through Village Studies," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 631-662, April.
    27. McErlean, Seamus & Wu, Ziping, 2003. "Regional agricultural labour productivity convergence in China," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 237-252, June.
    28. Alston, Julian M. & Pardey, Philip G. & Ruttan, Vernon W., 2008. "Research Lags Revisited: Concepts and Evidence from U.S. Agriculture," Staff Papers 50091, University of Minnesota, Department of Applied Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:63:y:2014:i:c:p:92-101. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Dana Niculescu). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.