Farmer organisation and enhanced access to markets

The main challenges facing smallholder farmers are that they often cannot meet strict food safety and quality control requirements and they are seldom able to provide sufficient volumes of products on a near-continuous basis. The problem is that the enthusiasm for farmer organizations has, at times,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inAppropriate technology Vol. 34; no. 1; pp. 41 - 43
Main Authors Meijer, Madelon, Hellin, Jon, Lundy, Mark
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Burnham Research Information Ltd 01.03.2007
Subjects
Agriculture
Associations
Corn
Costs
Effectiveness
Farm management
Farmers
Market entry
Public sector
Quality control
Subsidies
Supermarkets
Value chain
Vegetables
El Salvador
Mexico
Honduras
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Summary:The main challenges facing smallholder farmers are that they often cannot meet strict food safety and quality control requirements and they are seldom able to provide sufficient volumes of products on a near-continuous basis. The problem is that the enthusiasm for farmer organizations has, at times, obscured the fact that establishing viable organizations is not a simple process. This article explores these issues in the context of commodity maize in Mexico and high-value vegetables in Honduras and El Salvador. While there are advantages to farmer organization when it comes to accessing inputs, farmers report that there are no advantages to establishing a farmer organization to sell grain. The research suggested that the benefits of farmer organization are more evident in the vegetable sector characterized by high transaction costs associated with market access.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
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ISSN:0305-0920
1751-6900