Potato Supply Chain in Ethiopia: Access to Market Information, Farmers' Cooperatives and Margin in West Arsi Zone, Ethiopia
Author | : E. Randon |
Publisher | : |
Total Pages | : 90 |
Release | : 2012 |
ISBN-10 | : OCLC:1012550557 |
ISBN-13 | : |
Rating | : 4/5 (57 Downloads) |
Book excerpt: In Ethiopia governmental policies are focusing attention to the agricultural sector, aiming at moving farmers from subsistence farming to commercial farming, producing cash crops; according to the “Accelerated and Sustained Development to End Poverty” programme potato is one of the root crops, which was given high priority. Potato farming in Ethiopia is characterized by smallholder farmers, sometimes organized in small local peasant associations; looking at ware potatoes we can identify three chains, all of them showing difficulties in marketing the products because of scarce quality, high transaction costs and lack of price information. Often the supply chain includes intermediaries who stipulate agreements and contracts with the farmers in order to buy and re-sell their potatoes. Intermediaries often fix prices causing constraints to the marketing instead of facilitating it. The bargaining position of farmers and traders is not equal because of lack of market information among farmers. The main critical points of the potato supply chain are: shortage of input supply, fluctuating prices, interference of middlemen, lack of market information, lack of formal arrangements and efficiency of farmers’ cooperatives. The objectives of this research are: to investigate the access to market information of potato farmers and their gross margin in relation to the membership in cooperatives, the type of buyer and the type of contract farmers have; to investigate which factors influence farmers’ choice to engage in cooperatives.