A farming systems framework for targeting investment in Africa

Abstract

The livelihoods of African smallholder farmers are extremely diverse, reflecting the variety of natural resources and agricultural services available to farm families. These resources generally encompass different types of farmed and fallow land as well as water resources and common property resources, including grazing areas, forest and ponds. Farms are characterized by their specific farm resource endowments and family circumstances (history, preferences and projects). To produce food and meet multiple other household goals, farmers make decisions to manage resources and have various interdependent activities in crop, livestock and tree production, gathering as well as processing, marketing and off-farm work. The functioning of any individual farm system is also strongly influenced by the larger farm environment which is made up of social relations, economic opportunities, market arrangement, political incentives and the b io- physical context. Taking a systems approach helps to capture the complexity of smallholder agriculture and household logic for system improvement