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Moderated e-mail conference on small farms and food security

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Sat, 15 Oct 2016 11:09:05 +0000
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This is Arbab Ghulam Qadir, again.

I was waiting for a reply of Dick Tinsely. I will appreciate highly his input on all questions in the background document because Dick is extensively involved in research on small holders.

I have enjoyed reading Message 36 of Siera Vercillo. Great writing style. She can contribute well on all questions and on the issue of definition to classify farm as small because she has good working experience in Ghana. Other e-conference participants from Africa can also contribute on this.

In response to Bazyli Czyżewski (Message 33):

The background document under heading of 2.4 of this e-conference explains that: "An important aspect of the SALSA research project is that small farms, and food businesses, will be studied within the context of the food system to which they belong. By carrying out in-depth analyses in 30 different geographical regions in Europe and Africa, the project aims to obtain a differentiated understanding of the role of small farms in very different food systems and situations....In its actual empirical analysis, SALSA will look at the food system (and its sub-systems) as expressed in each of the 30 regions (with boundaries defined in geographical terms, such as a district or province).". 

Bazyli Czyżewski (message 33) suggested the SO approach for all countries. As seen from above, the SALSA project will focus on 30 European and African countries. Therefore, the definition of small farms in Europe and Africa should be different and should be on different criteria for each region.

As I have already given my opinion (Message 32) that farm size should be based on availability of irrigation water and access to market. There should be certain area of land to be fixed as the ceiling for a small farm in irrigated areas and in rain fed areas - for example 1-5 hectares in irrigated areas and 10-20 hectares in rain fed areas.

I conditionally agree for Europe only with Bazyli Czyżewski (message 33) as I understood - the farm with standard output below or equal to 25,000 euros per year will be included in FADN survey. Means these will be considered a small farm. If I convert this amount into local currency it is almost near to 2.8 million rupees per annum - that a large farmer in most of the developing countries would not even dream to have. Therefore, this is correct that every country will have to define this limit on the ground reality. But due to strong feudal system in our country, and I assume in most of the developing countries, the farming community hide their income to evade income tax. Therefore, I feel that standard output (SO) approach will not practically work in those countries. The friends from Africa can point out on this issue in relation to ground reality into their countries. 

Europe and Africa are two different areas. Therefore, SO criteria may work well in Europe but not in developing countries.

I would like to hear from Loupa Pius about how the small farmer is defined in Uganda and other African countries and impact of different definitions of small farmer.

Arbab Ghulam Qadir 
Senior Monitoring & Evaluation Coordinator
Management & Development Centre (Development Consultancy Firm),
Hyderabad, 
Sindh, 
Pakistan
Cell: 0092-302-5237326
Off: 0092-22--2653068
Email: gqarbab (at) gmail.com
Wed: www.mdcpk.org 

[To contribute to this conference, send your message to [log in to unmask] For further information, see http://www.fao.org/nr/research-extension-systems/res-home/news/detail/en/c/434322/ ].

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