Agrifood industry transformation and small farmers in developing countries

Abstract

The agrifood industry has undergone dramatic transformation in the last 60 years. There is mixed evidence on the transformation’s impact on small famers in developing countries. This article reviews the literature on these impacts from the 1980’s to present, and introduces a special issue focusing on agrifood industry transformation. It identifies two primary stages of the transformation of the agrifood industry as pre-liberalization/pre-globalization and liberalization/globalization. Various aspects of restructuring of the wholesale, processing, and retail sectors are covered, including: the modernized system of procurement; the switch from public to private standards; the increasingly significant role of credit and determinants for and effects of farmers’ participation in this transformation. It introduces the special issues’ contributions to the understanding of famers’ inclusion/exclusion, the benefits of inclusion, and the role of policy in the industry’s transformation.