How agroecology food system enhances social and political agency for Food Security and Nutrition (FSN) among smallholder farmers in Nigeria

Agroecology has been portrayed as a practice and as a sustainable food system aimed at promoting human well-being, sustainability, and social cohesion among agrarian communities. In contrast to the large body of literature linking agroecology to food security and nutrition through sustainable production practices associated with agroecology, research on how agroecology boasts social and political agency for food security and nutrition among smallholder farmers is sparse. We investigated the case of an agroecology group operating parallel to the dominant Agri-industrial food system in Southeast Nigeria. By applying a quantile semi-parametric propensity score matching approach we go beyond the state of the art to uncover the social and political pathways through which agroecology strengthens the food and nutrition security of smallholder farmers who lacks the capacity to integrate into the capitalistic food system. Apart from the sustainable farming practices associated with agroecology, our results point to additional indirect pathways such as peer-to-peer activities, gain in time use, self-provisioning, and production diversity through which agroecology as a farm organization positively influences the food security and nutrition of smallholder farmers. Furthermore, we found that the increase in food security and nutrition was highest among those farmers who balance self-provisioning and market dependence (about 50% of consumption comes from self-provisioning), compared to the extreme cases (those who are entirely dependent on the market for food). Our approach shows the value of the concept of reproduction of the environmental and social spheres in addressing nutrition and probably underscoring the success of any food system initiative on smallholder farm households, which are not solely integrated into the market economy.