Financial challenges by farmers

07th November 2017
by secretary

Paepard

6 November 2017. Brussels. How smallholder farmers feed the world. Which financial challenges to overcome? by Prof. Bina Agarwal, Professor of Development Economics and Environment at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, UK

All over the world, more than 500 million households are active in small scale family farming. As the world is becoming a global village and the agriculture in many countries is up scaling and making use of increasingly complex technologies, one could reasonably question the future of smallholder farmers.

However, over the last years, smallholder farmers have received increasing attention and support as the FAO proclaimed 2014 the international year of family farming and interdisciplinary experts forums such as IPES-Food are advocating for a paradigm shift in the current agro-food system.

Prof. Bina Agarwal addressed following questions at this session of the Microfinance Lunch Break.

How can the smallholder farmers contribute to fighting hunger while supporting local economic development and biodiversity as well as sustainable food systems ?
What are the challenges they face and how can microfinance contribute to overcome them ?

Prof. Bina Agarwal is an award-winning development economist with extensive experience in the fields of food security, gender inequality, agriculture and environmental governance. She is currently Professor at the GDI, University of Manchester, UK.

She played a key role in India’s inheritance law reforms and serves on the board of many international organizations, including IPES-Food. In 2016 she received the Order of Agricultural Merit, Government of France, and in 2017 the Agropolis Foundation’s Louis Malassis Prize for an “Outstanding Career in Agricultural Development”.

Source: PAEPARD FEED