Category: Africa

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Abeeb Babatunde Omotoso, Senior Lecturer at Oyo State College of Agriculture and Technology, Igboora, Nigeria and Senior Research Associate at North West University, North-West University

Agriculture is the backbone of Africa’s economy. It provides livelihoods for over 70% of the rural population and contributes to national food security and economic development.

For most rural households, farming is not just a source of income and sustenance. It also provides cultural identity and social stability. Over the past two decades, however, rural Africa has witnessed increasing levels of violent conflicts that undermine agricultural productivity, investment and long-term development.

Farmers facing insecurity often abandon productive crops, reduce land use and invest less in their farms. There are serious consequences for food security.

Conflict destroys lives and property. It also changes the decisions farmers make about investing in their land.

We are agricultural and applied economists with expertise in rural development,sustainable food system and climate-smart agriculture. We’ve studied the impact of conflict on food systems in the global south.

One of our studies examined how violent conflict influenced agricultural investment decisions among rural households in Nigeria. We combined nationally representative household data with detailed conflict records, to track how exposure to violence affects farming.

The findings showed that violent conflict altered agricultural investment decisions. It made farmers less likely to cultivate major crops.

The cultivation of yam, sweet potato, groundnut, cowpea, maize and cassava declined as conflict incidents increased. Sweet potato was the most affected, perhaps because it needs a lot of labour and a longer time to grow.

When conflict disrupts farming through abandoned fields, lost livestock, or altered investment decisions, it undermines food availability and long-term agricultural development.

Understanding these impacts is useful when designing ways to help farmers and sustain food systems in conflict-affected areas.

The reality

Our study used panel data from Nigeria’s Living Standards Measurement Study covering the periods 2012/2013, 2015/2016 and 2018/2019.

The national study provides detailed household-level information. This covers demographic characteristics, agricultural production, crop choice, land allocation, input use, production costs and market participation.

We combined the household coordinates with geocoded conflict data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED) to measure exposure to violent conflict. The ACLED database provides detailed information on battles, violence against civilians, remote violence, protests and riots.

Our study focused on three indicators of violent conflict exposure:

• total number of conflict incidents

• number of violent incidents affecting civilians (including Boko Haram-related violence)

• number of battles, including protests, riots and farmer–herder clashes.

To capture local exposure to violence, we measured conflict incidents within a radius of 10km of each surveyed household in a given year.

By linking spatial conflict data with household-level agricultural information across multiple survey waves, the study analysed how exposure to violent conflict influenced farmers’ production decisions, land allocation and agricultural outcomes over time.

The findings

The results indicate that insecurity discourages farmers from engaging in production activities that involve greater risk or long-term investment. Conflict exposure also affects land allocation decisions.

The analysis showed a reduction in the total cultivated land area and a decline in the share of land allocated to key staple crops.

This pattern suggests that farmers respond to insecurity by scaling down farming activities, avoiding distant plots, and concentrating on smaller or safer areas of land. Reducing the land cultivated may result in less food produced.

We found that conflict led to less spending on agricultural production. Farmers invested less in inputs such as fertilizer, pesticides and hired labour.

The effects varied across management types. Plots managed by men showed relatively stable investment levels. Production costs increased on plots managed by men and women. This could be due to reliance on external labour during periods of insecurity.

The findings demonstrate that violent conflict affects crop choices, reduces land use and discourages agricultural investment.

Disruptions also increase the cost of agricultural production and marketing, making farming less profitable. Government efforts to support agriculture, such as input subsidies and rural development programmes, don’t work so well in conflict zones.

The adverse effects are more severe for households in highly conflict-prone areas. Disputes have long-term economic impacts.

Recommendation and policy implications

The findings highlight the need for conflict-sensitive agricultural policies and targeted rural development interventions.

First, strong rural security and community conflict resolution mechanisms are essential. Government and local authorities should monitor security in major agricultural zones and help communities to build peace.

Policies should encourage farmers to plant climate-smart and low-risk crops that need fewer inputs and have shorter production cycles. This would make agricultural systems more resilient to conflict.

Extension services should advise farmers on which crops to plant, improved seed varieties, and farming strategies suitable for insecure environments.

Policymakers should invest in rural infrastructure and early-warning systems, including market access, transport networks and conflict monitoring systems.

– Violent conflicts are reshaping what Nigerian farmers grow: what this means for food security
– https://theconversation.com/violent-conflicts-are-reshaping-what-nigerian-farmers-grow-what-this-means-for-food-security-278719

Source: The Conversation – Africa – By David Campbell Francis, Senior Researcher, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the Witwatersrand

The informal economy is responsible for a large share of economic output across the continent. Yet economic policy is almost always designed for the formal economy and overlooks the informal economy.

We are labour-market economists interested in the informal economy and informal work. We have spent the last two years investigating the concept of an economic policy for informal workers. We spent several months interviewing informal traders, traders’ associations and key stakeholders. Our aim was to better understand their challenges, and to inform the development of an economic policy for informal trading.

Drawing on our research partnership with Women in Informal Employment Globalising and Organising, we argue that rethinking economic policy from the perspective of the informal economy is essential.

We begin from the premise that economic policy must actively support the everyday economy. Recognising informal traders as economic agents, and investing in systems that support them, allows local economies to become more resilient, inclusive and sustainable. Traders need a supportive ecosystem so they can move beyond survival, and contribute to local growth and development.

Our findings highlight five areas that should support a policy ecosystem: macroeconomic stability; efficient administration; regulation of competition; participation in policy and governance; and inclusive infrastructure.

On the ground

Our research focused on informal traders in Gauteng, South Africa’s economic hub. The sector provides vital income for marginalised communities and brings essential goods and services closer to where people live. Yet traders remain on the periphery of policy attention. Urban management often treats them as a problem to control rather than as economic actors to engage.

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Read more: Johannesburg has failed its informal traders: policies are in place, but action is needed

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Most informal traders are own-account workers, operating on survivalist incomes that often fall below the poverty line. They face unpredictable markets, limited access to infrastructure, and constant regulatory uncertainty. This makes it difficult to grow their businesses or improve earnings.

These difficulties reflect the fact that informal traders operate in environments that have multiple layers. These include:

• local factors: municipal regulations, permits, policing, infrastructure, competition, community networks

• broader national forces: macroeconomic trends, regulatory frameworks, structural inequalities, formal-sector dominance.

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Read more: Johannesburg’s produce market has supplied the informal sector for decades: a refresh is due

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Understanding these interlocking layers is essential when creating policies that support sustainable livelihoods and growth.

Five policy pillars

(1) Macroeconomic stability

This needs to be the first pillar of the economic policy. The informal sector is highly sensitive to macroeconomic conditions for a number of reasons.

Firstly, informal traders earn low and unstable incomes. This means that rising living costs quickly erode their ability to sustain livelihoods. This is particularly true when it comes to food, transport and energy prices.

Secondly, the sector is vulnerable to poor growth and unemployment. The informal economy functions as a safety net during economic downturns by absorbing workers displaced from the formal sector. This was well illustrated during the COVID pandemic. But there’s a downside. A flood of new entrants into a constrained sector leads to overcrowding. In turn this:

• leads to intensified competition for limited trading spaces

• disrupts existing organisational systems

• weakens trader networks

• reduces earnings.

Macroeconomic instability, therefore, expands informality. It also threatens informal livelihoods.

Revisiting macroeconomic policy should also include a tax policy that doesn’t prejudice informal workers.

(2) Efficient administration

Administrative inefficiencies and exclusionary practices create barriers for informal traders. For example, delays in issuing permits and other documentation leave traders vulnerable to harassment, bribery and eviction.

Inconsistent enforcement of bylaws creates an uneven playing field. Compliant traders are disadvantaged while irregular practices persist.

These burdens are not solely the result of local government shortcomings. They also reflect national-level failures such as delays in processing asylum-seeker applications. This disadvantages traders who rely on formal documentation to operate legally.

Together, these administrative challenges have a number of knock-on effects. They:

• intensify competition over limited spaces

• erode trust in authorities

• constrain the stability and growth of the informal sector.

(3) Regulation of competition

The South African informal sector faces competition on multiple fronts.

Traders compete among themselves for a limited number of customers and trading spaces. They also face intense competition from the formal sector. Examples include supermarkets, retail chains and shopping malls. Informal traders are pushed into less profitable or precarious locations.

It’s often assumed that there’s perfect competition in the sector – that market players can trade freely.

But they do face structural disadvantages such as regulatory barriers, formal-sector dominance and uneven access to prime trading spaces.

Formal-sector expansion is framed as economic “development”. But it frequently displaces long-standing informal systems.

Intense and unfair competition in the informal sector has another consequence: it forces traders to compete primarily on price rather than quality or service. This is because they can’t match the economies of scale, marketing power, or infrastructure advantages of formal retailers and better-resourced informal traders.

(4) Participation in policy and governance

An economic policy for informal traders needs to emerge from their involvement in policy and governance discussions.

Informal traders are often excluded from the planning and decision-making processes around things that affect them. This includes bylaw enforcement, market design and permit systems.

The result is policies that fail to reflect the realities of informal trade. In turn this:

• creates unnecessary obstacles

• increases uncertainty

• limits traders’ ability to plan, invest and grow.

(5) Inclusive infrastructure

Many traders operate in spaces without electricity, water, sanitation or safe storage facilities. Poor infrastructure limits the types of goods traders can sell and increases operational. It also exposes both traders and customers to health and safety risks.

Too often, cities treat infrastructure provision for informal traders as optional. Or it’s not designed with the needs of informal traders in mind.

This neglect produces unsafe and precarious work environments, undermining both livelihoods and local economic activity.

Infrastructure that is designed to meet traders’ needs will translate investment into higher productivity, improved earnings, safer working conditions and more vibrant local markets. This will benefit both traders and the communities they serve.

– Economic policy in South Africa neglects informal traders: 5 focus areas to support the sector 
– https://theconversation.com/economic-policy-in-south-africa-neglects-informal-traders-5-focus-areas-to-support-the-sector-278323