Regional Markets

4 Opportunities for development
examples of smallholders securing and enjoying sustainable access to local markets, primarily
through collective marketing. Unsurprisingly, organising farmers, producers and
smallholders is at the core of the project’s strategies. A pro-poor approach should focus first
and foremost on the most vulnerable, and it seems that almost all the surveyed cases seem
to keep this focus. It is clear however that a sustained multi-year effort is needed to secure
smallholder access to power and governance structures. The level of organisation does differ,
however, depending on local conditions. In some cases the organisation of small-scale
producers is focused more on strengthening the position of smallholders (empowerment
and capacity building). In other cases, the smallholders have advanced their position in the
value chain, with adding value and developing commercial enterprises. 19
Figure 4.1 illustrates the focus of the projects with regard to the level of market orientation.
A position in the right hand means a high commercial focus, i.e. more emphasis
on the financial aspects of participating in the market rather than on social aspects such
as the organisation of producers as a goal (and thus a predominantly pro-poor strategy
– low commercial focus). We chose to present the graph in a linear (one-dimensional)
way, and will present the assessment of the cases on the other dimensions in a similar
way for ease of comparison.
To briefly discuss some examples, NGOMA’s market focus is more social – with an
emphasis on producer organisation- rather than commercial. The Zimbabwean banana
project is moving away from a producer organisation approach towards a more commercial
strategy. TAHA is positioned towards the right, as the association has clearly a
more commercial focus in its strategy.
4.1 Market orientation
NGOMA
FoSHoL
RUDI
Senegal
C:AVA
ZIM banana
Coffee TZ
LOW
HIGH
Cotton ZIM
TAHA
FT
Fig 4.1 illustrates the focus on market orientation that the projects had at the time of the write clinic.
19 This section focuses on the pro-poor development aspect of the cases. It should be emphasised that pro-poor interventions
are usually closely connected to many of the other focal points: gender, governance issues, food quality and security,
infrastructure, pricing, innovation and sustainability. Indeed, most interventions work simultaneously on several focal areas.
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