Abstract Agriculture in developing countries is characterized by a predominant reliance on smallholder farming and by the multitude of challenges these producers face. These challenges stem from socio-economic structural inequalities specific to these countries, as well as from environmental drivers such as climate change. Smallholder agriculture is particularly sensitive to issues including food security, climate adaptation, biodiversity, sustainable use of environmental resources, and market access. Operations Research (OR) methods have been widely used as decision-support tools in agriculture for decades. This paper reviews forty-four years of publications addressing the application of OR methods to smallholder agriculture in developing countries. The reviewed literature is analysed along multiple dimensions, including modelling scales, applied OR techniques, decision objectives and constraints, and the challenges addressed. Beyond identifying descriptive trends–such as the growing use of micro-scale modelling, the diversification of methodological approaches, and the prominence of policy-oriented applications–the paper synthesizes the findings into an integrative conceptual framework. This framework articulates how OR has been embedded in smallholder decision-making by linking the determinants shaping research scope and objectives, the corresponding methodological responses, and the mediation and application of research outputs across decision levels. The final section discusses future perspectives for extending the impact of OR-based decision support, including the potential role of information and communication technologies in improving accessibility for small-scale farmers and the challenges associated with agricultural digitalization in developing countries.
Huguet et al. (Thu,) studied this question.