A few days ago, The New York Times had an article discussing the gains to trade created by contract farming arrangements between PepsiCo and smallholders in Jalisco, Mexico. What the article describes is typical in the academic literature on agricultural value chains:
Category: Development
Nestlé Prize for Creating Shared Value
Nestlé S.A. has opened nominations for its 2012 Prize in Creating Shared Value:
“The Nestlé Prize in Creating Shared Value offers advice and financial support of up to CHF 500,000 (more than USD 480,000) to an individual, non-government organisation, or small enterprise working in the field of nutrition, water, or rural development.
It is awarded in alternate years to an innovation or project that has shown outstanding promise in improving access to, or management of, water; enhancing the lives of farmers and rural communities; or providing better nourishment to communities suffering from nutritional deficiencies.”
More information is available here. This is a nice occasion for aid workers and development practitioners to get recognized for their efforts.
(HT: Marion Nestle, via Twitter.)
Can Small Farmers Feed the World?
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) posted a link on its Twitter feed yesterday to a document entitled “Smallholders Can Feed the World.”
Upon closer inspection, it turns out that the document really is mostly a marketing brochure for IFAD’s activities, but the document is not completely devoid of interest. Indeed, it discusses how smallholders can actually feed the world when they are integrated in agricultural value chains. It gives the example of Ahmad Abdelmunem Al-Far, an Egyptian who