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Upgrading of smallholder agro-food production in Africa: the role of lead firm strategies and new markets

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  • Niels Fold
  • Marianne Nylandsted Larsen

Abstract

This paper addresses the main dynamics in the global agro-industrial value chains for tropical products. It examines new upgrading opportunities for smallholder production in Africa as a consequence of two dominant trends within global agricultural value chains. The first is caused by the dynamics of the co-existing collaboration and intensified rivalry between lead firms within the same chain. The other is caused by new opportunities and challenges stemming from increased requirements on retailer-driven markets in the North and expansion of new markets in the South. The paper points out the need to rectify the heavily biased policy focus on standard compliance with the purpose of strengthening smallholder incorporation and upgrading in retailer-driven strands of global value chains ending in the North. Instead, markets in the South and in emerging economies may function as a training ground for upgrading of African smallholder production via increases in volume and consistency of exports.

Suggested Citation

  • Niels Fold & Marianne Nylandsted Larsen, 2011. "Upgrading of smallholder agro-food production in Africa: the role of lead firm strategies and new markets," International Journal of Technological Learning, Innovation and Development, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 4(1/2/3), pages 39-66.
    • Handle: RePEc:ids:ijtlid:v:4:y:2011:i:1/2/3:p:39-66
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Maile, Felix, 2020. "Cooperation or confrontation? Public and private governance and smallholders' incomes in the cocoa sector in Ghana and in Côte d'Ivoire," ÖFSE-Forum, Austrian Foundation for Development Research (ÖFSE), volume 74, number 74.
    2. Wenbin Huang & Andreas Wilkes & Xiufang Sun & Anne Terheggen, 2013. "Who is importing forest products from Africa to China? An analysis of implications for initiatives to enhance legality and sustainability," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 339-354, April.
    3. Pasquali, Giovanni & Krishnan, Aarti & Alford, Matthew, 2021. "Multichain strategies and economic upgrading in global value chains: Evidence from Kenyan horticulture," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    4. Jonathan Bashi Rudahindwa & Sophie van Huellen, 2020. "Regional developmentalism in West Africa: The case for commodity-based industrialisation through regional cooperation in the cocoa-chocolate sector," Working Papers 239, Department of Economics, SOAS University of London, UK.
    5. Stefan Nier & Oliver Klein & Christine Tamásy, 2019. "Global Crop Value Chains: Shifts and Challenges in South-North Relations," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-16, March.
    6. Sophie van Huellen & Fuad Mohammed Abubakar, 2021. "Potential for Upgrading in Financialised Agri-food Chains: The Case of Ghanaian Cocoa," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 33(2), pages 227-252, April.

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