it;s not about challenges that the world today is facing it's more about the country u are analyzing. poor farmers have small holding of land and some have no land to farm so for that poor part of the population it still is better policy.

I think there are two important smallholder contribute to the development of economy:

First, entrepreneurial spirit to take risks and adapt to the market development of agricultural activity variables

Secondly, this innovation to develop new products and explore new production methods of ... Etc

dear dr. Emma Gausi,

your question is  interesting. To my point view, it is depands on the country or region issue.

in the free market today, how smallholder links to the big market is a problem.

the small scale of land has advantage-----easy to transfer to adjust their direction

yuwen 

Since subsistence agriculture still continues to represent the primary source of income for many of smallholder in Africa, the development of this contient will depend on thegrowth agricultural sector.  As you agricultural sector represents an important source of employment and contributes more than 50% to the African GDP.

That is an important question indeed.  Most countries in sub-Saharan Africa have agro-based economies and a bulk of this land is in the hands of smallholder farmers. As a result smallholder farmers are the key to lifting rural masses out of poverty. The first step towards any prospect of rural industrialization lies within agricultural development. The most important thing would be for enabling policies to enhance their productivity and enabling policies when it comes to linking them to the markets. However one problem that has been noted in literature is that most smallholders do not see farming as a business, they see it as an occupation which once their fortunes change they will leave and look for better employment.

The work that you can look at would be in Agricultural Economics journals, World Development Journal (Barrett, Chamberlain, Jayne, Doward, Kydd, are some of the authors who have done extensive work) and Policy publications- IFAD and IFPRI publications. Most of the work has been covered in economics, however if smallholders are to participate in the markets successfully, there is an urgent imperative for other disciplines such as marketing to also bring in their perspective. Marketing's focus on individual mindsets and behaviours can contribute new ideas on how best the smallholder farmers can move are way from being unviable economic entities who have little belief in their abilities as agents that can bring about economic turnaround.

A very interesting and important question indeed. I do not think that one can answer the question with a yes or no, as the answer will depend on a number of factors (as have been mentioned in the responses above). In my opinion, one of the most critical aspects of this 'issue' is the decision of the respective governments on what the precise role of agriculture (industrial as well as subsistent) in the development plan of a country and to involve the 'stakeholders' in such decision and implementation process. In starting an implementation process and not having the support/agreement of the small farmers make no sense. In addition, in order to keep the rural areas a viable option for small farmers to stay it will require targeted development efforts, including infrastructural, educational, health related etc. If not, the rural areas will not be an attractive place to be!

You could take a look at the work of my research institute (Bioversity International) which is very much involved to research issues that are at the interface of genetic diversity/resources and small scale farming in the tropics.

Best of luck with your research and subsequent implementation of the findings!

Jan Engels

This is a crucial question as African countries are seeking to become emerging economies. This is realized only when African countries increase sustainably their average income per capita and change the livelihood of their population.

The economy of most African countries is still largely dominated by agriculture and to my knowledge Malawi is not an exception. Moreover, Agriculture sector is mainly conducted by those smallholders farmers in mainly difficult production environment (exposed to weather condition, many production stress). The majority of poor come from rural areas and mainly from agriculture sector.

The issue here is not whether these smallholder farmers can or should continue feeding Malawi economy like other African countries. The issue is how to increase the productivity and the competitiveness of Africa agriculture and Malawi particularly? There is a need to build the capacity of those smallholder farmers and facilitate their access to more productive resources in order to increase their productivity, increase their participation to local, national and international markets. As this will help to increase their income and their contribution to national income generation then their wellbeing. Of course, a strong private-public-partnership (PPP) and institutional arrangements are important in the process to achieve such goal.

My answer to your question would be an unequivocal “yes”. Your question implies that, if the answer is that smallholder agriculture is NOT relevant, that some set of policies should be pursued to consolidate agricultural holdings into larger units. This is a misunderstanding of the development process. I suggest you read the second chapter—“Land: The Triumph of Gardening”—in Joe Studwell’s How Asia Works. The book itself addresses the question of why East Asian economies of Japan, Korea and Taiwan have achieved high levels of development but the countries of Southeast Asia have lagged behind. I know that this is not about Africa but one of his key points—that land reform is a key initial stimulus of economic growth—is relevant to all countries.

A good way to think about the question is to recognize that farm size is related to many other economic conditions and resources. Farms are small because, for many living on these farms, it is their best economic opportunity. It may also be the optimal size of farm for many kinds of enterprises such as horticultural crops or raising chickens. As Studwell points out, farmers are the best people to figure out what is the best use of their resources. The goal is to generate income for the farm family and the farmer should allowed to decide what combination of resources—land, labor, capital, water and other inputs—will be best for the welfare of the family. The policy objective should be to provide as much extension information to farmers as possible to help them make good decisions on how to allocate their scarce resources.

There is also a human capital dimension to this question. When I was just out of college, I joined a US government volunteer program, the Peace Corps, and was sent to work with sugar cane workers in Northeast Brazil. Large sugar cane plantations hired thousands of workers, paying them a minimum daily wage and providing them with housing and, if they were lucky, a small plot for planting vegetables for their own consumption. The workers were essentially tied to the plantation and under the thumb of the plantation owner. The Brazilian government discontinued the Peace Corps program with sugarcane workers after a year so I moved to a small interior town to work with small subsistence farmers. I was amazed at the difference in the atmosphere. Small farmers showed much more independence and initiative than the cane workers. Although most were very poor, they still had to take risks and make decisions on what and when to plant and how to organize their families’ affairs. Many of the sons and daughters of these families migrated to Southern Brazil to take entry-level jobs in Brazil’s expanding industrial sector. It is my firm belief that smallholder agriculture creates the human capital that can drive broader economic development.

 Food security remains a concern in many African countries. The subsistence agriculture may contribute to households' food security. as chronic under-nutrition is likely to affect negatively economic growth.  

I think  subsistence agriculture is important for the general food security of the country more so,  if the right policies to prevent further fragmentation are implemented; in order to ensure  technological efficiency. Kindly follow Prof. Mark Odhiambo on his view on this matter...

Your question that smallholder agriculture still be enough to effectively and efficiently lead an economy such as Malawi to sustainable economic growth and development. It quite interesting and important question. I have more experience of Indian agriculture on the basis of one can conclude like this.

The overpopulated country requires trade off between employment  and economic efficiency as the foremost concern. Small farming lacks viability, efficiecy and effectiveness for adoption of technologies. But the country cannot afford to keep people unemployed too. Growth rate in agriculture is slow by default. It has to plan slow and systematic siphoning out of population from agriculture and adjust in manufacturing and service sectors. 

I hope this is possible and reasonable under the situation. 

There are many excellent articles that argue for the importance of agriculture to overall development. Google:  economic development small farm africa

There has been a host of papers on this question in the 1950's and 70's. Unfortunately, most of them are now  lost! Yet, for macro economic consideration, see Arthur LEWIS, as well as the "two sectors models" litterature  (see especilaly litterature review by Mullignan). Also, a very fascinationg recent paper  by Bruno Dorin. " a world without farmers ? the lewis path revisited", (working paper by CIRED, paris france).

On the micro economic side, I contributed myself on economies of scale (they are virtually inexistent in agriculture) and capital building (here is the main factior of development,  made difficult by risk and uncertainty. See the concept of economies of scale in a multiproduct industry", in european review of agricultural economics, vol 3

As african countries are relient on agriculture sector and 80% of their population lives in rural areas, agricultural development is the engine of the growth

Absolutely true. The Western model of extensive farming is not the way for us.