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SIERRA LEONE maq 4ª.indd - agrilife - Europa

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improved management strategies at pre and postharvest<br />

stages are crucial.<br />

6.2 Evaluation of the economic<br />

performance and viability of<br />

smallholders<br />

In order to evaluate the economic<br />

performance and the viability of farm households<br />

at farm level, first the smallholders were grouped<br />

into different farm types depending on their crop<br />

orientation. This farm typology is important in<br />

order to understand to which extent the farm<br />

production system affects the performance of the<br />

farm households given the resource availability<br />

they have (6.2.1). Once a detailed typology is in<br />

place, the results of the farm household income<br />

calculation are presented (6.2.2): i.e. the Farm<br />

Net Income (and Cash Income) calculations at<br />

farm level and Gross Margin (output value and<br />

input costs) calculations at crop production<br />

level, focusing especially on rice as the main<br />

staple food and coffee and cocoa tree cropping<br />

as the main cash crops. Then, economic results<br />

are analysed in relation to the reproduction<br />

threshold (in order to assess farm viability)<br />

and the poverty line (for evaluating household<br />

viability) (6.2.3).<br />

6.2.1 Farm typology<br />

The typology of smallholders is based on<br />

clustering them according to their similarity/<br />

difference in terms of socio-economic and<br />

agro-environmental characteristics. In order to<br />

characterise the farms within the regions – first<br />

step of the typology - the main criteria often used<br />

are biophysical conditions, resource endowments,<br />

land use, specialisation, intensification, farm<br />

managements and socio-economic conditions<br />

as well as orientation of production activities<br />

(market, self-consumption), position of the<br />

household in the ‘farm developmental cycle’<br />

(Forbes, 1949; cited by Crowley, 1997) and main<br />

sources of the income for the household (Tittonell<br />

et al., 2010).<br />

The description of farm households in<br />

section 6.1 shows that within regions very<br />

similar socio-economic and agro-environmental<br />

characteristics are shared among smallholders.<br />

Differences between farm households are<br />

mainly found in terms of crop specialisation and<br />

crop mix. The differences in crop orientation<br />

also mark a difference concerning production<br />

activities for marketing or self-consumption.<br />

Thus, the smallholders were typified according<br />

to these two main criteria. The steps followed<br />

to set up the farm typology for the Sierra Leone<br />

survey consisted of first classifying the main<br />

production activities (in terms of crop mixes)<br />

across all surveyed farms for the Northern and<br />

Eastern districts. Secondly, farms were split<br />

into farm types according to their dominant<br />

production orientation for either market or selfconsumption.<br />

In the studied areas the main crop<br />

production activities are: rice production<br />

(upland and lowland rice), tree cropping<br />

(including cash crops: cocoa, coffee and selfconsumption<br />

tree crops: oil palm), and other<br />

food production (including all other food<br />

crops produced e.g. vegetables, cassava).<br />

Consequently, farm typology was initially<br />

defined based on the mix of these three main<br />

crop production activities. Accordingly, farms<br />

may as a first step fit into one of the following<br />

options:<br />

- rice only,<br />

- rice & other food crops<br />

- rice & tree<br />

- rice & other food crops & tree, and<br />

- tree only.<br />

The number of farms and the proportion<br />

of the total area devoted under each of the<br />

categories described above for all surveyed farms<br />

are illustrated in Figure 39 and Figure 40.<br />

It can be seen that the majority of the<br />

households base their farm production on mixed<br />

cropping system. The most dominant ones are i)<br />

Rural poverty reduction and food security: The case of smallholders in Sierra Leone<br />

101

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