Improving smallholders' market participation: Insights from a business scheme for maize in Limpopo Province, South Africa

Abstract

It is widely acknowledged that lack of market participation and limited access to agricultural services contribute to keeping semi-subsistence farmers trapped in poverty. This paper discusses the potential of an innovative business scheme to enhance smallholders' situations by providing access to an integrated service provision scheme. The authors conducted an integrated analysis of farmers' production, consumption and processing patterns using case-based evidence. While confirming that the presence of rural depots can improve smallholders' access to services, they also highlight some drawbacks of private intervention and show the importance of taking into account the diversity of economic and social factors when designing smallholder support instruments.

Keywords:

• market access
• integrated service provision
• one stop shops
• isolated rural areas
• milling sector

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Agathe Fabre, Christian Chéron, Johann Kirsten and Isaac Minde for useful comments and suggestions, and the International Water Management Institute and Food Challenge Programme and the National Fortification Alliance for their support.

Notes

¹ Service milling is commonly referred to as swap milling, as the smallholder takes his own maize home but in a different form (i.e. meal instead of grain). The two terms are used interchangeably.

²Maize production also serves to fulfil social obligations, being used for gifts and ceremonies, for example.

³This is the period during which farmers who are not self-sufficient are obliged to buy maize meal because they do not produce sufficient maize grain for the whole year.