Agrarian change and rising vulnerability in rural sub-Saharan Africa

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. Deborah Bryceson, Cristobal Kay & Jos Mooij (eds), Disappearing Peasantries? Rural Labour in Africa, Asia and Latin America (Intermediate Technology Publications, 2000). 2. Goran Hyden, Beyond Ujamaa in Tanzania: Underdevelopment and an Uncaptured Peasantry (Heinemann, 1980). 3. This and the next section draw on an as yet unpublished workshop paper Frank Ellis, 'Small Farms, Livelihood Diversification, and Rural–Urban Transitions: Strategic Issues in Sub-Saharan Africa', in International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), The Future of Small Farms: Proceedings of a Research Workshop, Wye, UK, 26–29 June 2005. 4. World Bank, Accelerated Development in Sub-Saharan Africa (World Bank, 1981). 5. For example Anne O. Krueger, Maurice Schiff & Alberto Valdes (eds), The Political Economy of Agricultural Pricing Policy, Volume 3: Africa and the Mediterranean (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991). 6. Brian Cooksey, 'Marketing Reform? The Rise and Fall of Agricultural Liberalisation in Tanzania', in Frank Ellis & H. Ade Freeman (eds), Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction Policies (Routledge, 2005), pp. 149–165. 7. Bryceson et al., Disappearing Peasantries? 8. See Ellis & Freeman, Rural Livelihoods. LADDER, standing for Livelihoods and Diversification Directions Explored by Research, was a research programme funded from 2000–2004 by the then Policy Research Programme of the Department for International Development (DFID), with a contribution to work in Kenya made by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). 9. For evidence and discussion see T. S. Jayne, Takahashi Yamano, Michael T. Weber, David Tschirley, Rui Benfica, Anthony Chapata & Ballard Zulu, 'Smallholder Income and Land Distribution in Africa: Implications for Poverty Reduction Strategies', Food Policy, Vol. 28, No. 3 (2003), pp. 253–75; T. S. Jayne, D. Mather & E. Mghenyi, 'Smallholder Farming in Difficult Circumstances: Policy Issues for Africa', in IFPRI, The Future of Small Farms. 10. There remain some exceptions to this inexorable tightening of land supply, notably much of rural Zambia, but in most SSA countries it applies, and within them it applies with particular force to high potential agricultural zones. 11. The average farm size across 1295 households in four countries in the LADDER project was around 1.5 ha. Between 40 and 50 per cent of households by country sample had farm sizes under 1 ha in 2001. See also Sholto Cross, 'Comparative Land Tenure Issues Arising in Four Countries'; Ellis & Freeman, Rural Livelihoods, pp. 183–97. 12. See, for example, Robert Netting, Smallholders, Householders: Farm Families and the Ecology of Intensive, Sustainable Agriculture (Stanford University Press, 1993), for discussion of these reasons in peasant farming societies in the North as well as the South. 13. Deborah Bryceson, 'Deagrarianization and Rural Employment in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Sectoral Perspective', World Development, Vol. 24, No. 1 (1996), pp. 97–111; Deborah Bryceson, 'African Rural Labour, Income Diversification and Livelihood Approaches: A Long-Term Development Perspective', Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 26, No. 80 (1999), pp. 171–89; Deborah Bryceson, 'The Scramble in Africa: Reorienting Rural Livelihoods', World Development, Vol. 30, No. 5 (2002); Deborah Bryceson & Vali Jamal (eds), Farewell to Farms: Deagrarianisation and Employment in Africa, Research Series No. 1997/10, African Studies Centre, 1997, pp. 3–20. 14. Frank Ellis, Rural Livelihoods and Diversity in Developing Countries (Oxford University Press, 2000); Frank Ellis & H. Ade Freeman, 'Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction Strategies in Four African Countries', Journal of Development Studies, Vol. 40, No. 4 (2004), pp. 1–30; Thomas Reardon, 'Using Evidence of Household Income Diversification to Inform Study of the Rural Nonfarm Labor Market in Africa', World Development, Vol. 25, No. 5 (1997), pp. 735–47. 15. Ellis & Freeman, Rural Livelihoods; Chris Barrett, Thomas Reardon & Patrick Webb, 'Nonfarm Income Diversification and Household Livelihood Strategies in Rural Africa: Concepts, Dynamics and Policy Implications', Food Policy, Vol. 26, No. 4 (2001), pp. 315–31. 16. Frank Ellis & Ntengua Mdoe, 'Livelihoods and Rural Poverty Reduction in Tanzania', World Development, Vol. 31, No. 8 (2003), pp. 1367–84. 17. Frank Ellis & H. Ade Freeman, 'Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction Strategies in Four African Countries', Journal of Development Studies, Vol. 40, No. 4 (2004), pp. 1–30. 18. Chris Barrett & Brent M. Swallow, 'Dynamic Poverty Traps and Rural Livelihoods', in Ellis & Freeman, Rural Livelihoods, pp. 16–28. 19. Elizabeth Francis, Making a Living: Changing Livelihoods in Rural Africa (Routledge, 2000). 20. For an earlier example see Frank Ellis, 'Agricultural Marketing and Peasant–State Transfers in Tanzania', Journal of Peasant Studies, Vol. 10, No. 4 (1983), pp. 214–42. 21. Twenty-eight countries have so far benefited from HIPC debt relief to the amount of US$33 billion in 2004 net present value terms. See IMF and World Bank, Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative – Status of Implementation (August 2005), http://www.imf.org/external/np/hipc/doc.htm. 22. In 2002, overall aid to SSA countries was US$18.4 billion, equivalent to 6 per cent of their combined gross national income (GNI). However, aid as a proportion of GNI for some countries was many times higher than this – for example Mozambique (60 per cent), Sierra Leone (47 per cent), Ethiopia (22 per cent) and Malawi (20 per cent). See OECD, Development Assistance Committee (DAC), 2004 Development Cooperation Report (OECD, 2004), Statistical Annex, Table 25. 23. Many developing country exporters of cane sugar participate in the EU-ACP scheme whereby they have been receiving quota prices equivalent to those paid to EU domestic producers. The proposed fall in the level of EU support prices will therefore hit those exporters hard (compensatory transfers are under discussion), while the ensuing predicted rise in the world price of sugar caused by curtailing EU surplus production will adversely affect net sugar importing countries. See, for example, 'Downside for Africa in cutting sugar price', The Guardian, 20 June 2005. 24. Dave Weatherspoon & Thomas Reardon, 'The Rise of Supermarkets in Africa: Implications for Agrifood Systems and the Rural Poor', Development Policy Review, Vol. 21, No. 3 (2003), pp. 333–55; Thomas Reardon, C. Peter Timmer, Christopher Barrett & Julio Berdegue, 'The Rise of Supermarkets in Africa, Asia, and Latin America', American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Vol. 85, No. 5 (2003), pp. 1140–6. 25. Robert Chambers, 'Editorial Introduction: Vulnerability, Coping and Policy', IDS Bulletin, Vol. 20, No. 2 (1989), pp. 1–7; Amartya Sen, Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlements and Deprivation (Clarendon Press, 1981). 26. See especially Stefan Dercon, 'Income Risk, Coping Strategies, and Safety Nets', The World Bank Research Observer, Vol. 17, No. 2 (2002), pp. 141–66; Stefan Dercon (ed.), Insurance Against Poverty (UNU-WIDER Studies in Development Economics, Oxford University Press, 2005); Stephen Devereux, 'Poverty, Livelihoods & Famine', paper prepared for the Ending Famine in the 21st Century Conference, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, 27 February–1 March 2002. 27. Stefan Dercon, 'Vulnerability: A Micro Perspective', in Francois Bourgignon (ed.), Proceedings of the Annual Bank Conference in Development Economics (World Bank, forthcoming 2006). 28. Alex de Waal & Alan Whiteside, '"New Variant Famine": AIDS and Food Crisis in Southern Africa', The Lancet, No. 362 (2003), pp. 1234–7. 29. Ethiopia, Ministry of Finance and Economic Development (MoFED), Ethiopia: Sustainable Development and Poverty Reduction Program (2002).