•There are more than 608 million farms in the world.•Family farms produce roughly 80% of the world’s food in value terms.•Farms smaller than 2 hectares produce roughly 35% of the world’s food.•The ...largest one percent of farms operating 70 percent of the its farmland.•Agricultural censuses must cover non-household farms.
Numerous attempts have been made to estimate the share of the world’s food produced by family farms and by farms of different sizes. This paper updates estimates of the number of farms worldwide, their distribution and that of farmland, using the most recent agricultural censuses available, in combination with survey data where needed. It finds there are more than 608 million farms in the world, more than 90% of which are family farms (by our definition), and they occupy around 70–80% of farmland and produce roughly 80% of the world’s food in value terms. The paper also underscores the importance of not referring to family farms and small farms (i.e., those of less than two hectares) interchangeably: small farms account for 84% of all farms worldwide, as per the available census information, but operate only around 12% of all agricultural land, and produce roughly 35% of the world’s food (well below the 80% produced by family farms). A comprehensive examination of changes in farmland distribution over time is also provided to showcase the increased concentration of farmland among large farms as economies grow. The largest 1% of farms in the world (those larger than 50 ha) operate more than 70% of the world's farmland. These estimates are not free from bias given existing data gaps. The paper underscores the need to ensure that agricultural censuses cover non-household farms in order to enhance our understanding of agriculture and food production worldwide.
Muitas pesquisas têm comparado a diferença do desempenho econômico de produtores agrícolas orgânicos certificados e não certificados, mas eles apresentam resultados divergentes. Alguns desses ...trabalhos corrigiram o viés de seleção devido às variáveis observáveis, porém, nenhum deles tratou adequadamente a questão do viés relativo às variáveis não observáveis. Neste estudo se aplica o método Propensity Score Matching para corrigir o viés das variáveis observáveis, e a técnica recentemente desenvolvida por Millimet e Tchernis (2010) para corrigir o viés que surge do não atendimento ao pressuposto da independência condicional (CIA). Foram utilizados os dados do Censo Agropecuário (IBGE, 2006) da agricultura familiar no Brasil, com 71.189 observações. Os resultados confirmaram a hipótese da pesquisa, revelando que os agricultores familiares brasileiros certificados possuem 10% a mais em sua renda e cerca de 30% a mais no lucro, além de terem maior integração com o mercado.
In Thomas Jefferson's day, 90 percent of the population worked on family farms. Today, in a world dominated by agribusiness, less than 1 percent of Americans claim farm-related occupations. What was ...lost along the way is something that Evelyn I. Funda experienced firsthand when, in 2001, her parents sold the last parcel of the farm they had worked since they married in 1957. Against that landscape of loss, Funda explores her family's three-generation farming experience in southern Idaho, where her Czech immigrant family spent their lives turning a patch of sagebrush into crop land.The story of Funda's family unfolds within the larger context of our country's rich immigrant history, western culture, and farming as a science and an art. Situated at the crossroads of American farming, Weeds: A Farm Daughter's Lament offers a clear view of the nature, the cost, and the transformation of the American West. Part cultural history, part memoir, and part elegy, the book reminds us that in losing our attachment to the land we also lose some of our humanity and something at the very heart of our identity as a nation.
Purpose
Family farms are seen as a powerful force for rural development, and they are gaining more and more research attention. This study aims to explore the relationship between the social networks ...of family farms and the dual innovation of the family farm business model from the perspective of entrepreneurial orientation.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a questionnaire survey of 169 family farms in Qingdao, China, descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data collected. The study hypothesis was tested using inferential tests (regression analysis).
Findings
The study results show that innovative, efficiency- and novelty-based business models facilitated by social networks have a favorable and significant impact on the performance of family farms. Furthermore, the relationship between social networks and new business model creation is positively influenced by an entrepreneurial orientation.
Originality/value
This study is distinctive in that it examines the mechanisms underlying family farm growth from an entrepreneurial standpoint, classifying family farm social networks for the first time into social, market and governmental categories and looking at their impact on the creation of new business models. In addition, it looks into the relationship between the innovation and social network aspect of the family farm business model from an entrepreneurial perspective, offering fresh insight into this connection. It also examines the family farm business model’s connection to innovation and social networks from an entrepreneurial standpoint, providing new insight into this relationship.
The overuse of chemical fertilizers and pesticides (CFPs) has negatively impacted the environment and human health. It is an urgent issue that should be addressed. In this study, we investigate ...whether agricultural cooperatives can serve as an institutional arrangement that helps reduce the consumption of CFPs, using the data of 2012 family farms from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China. Various approaches, including instrumental variable-based two-stage residual inclusion approach (2SRI), endogenous switching probit (ESP) model, and endogenous switching regression (ESR) model, are utilized to help address the endogeneity issues of the cooperative membership variable. The results show that agricultural cooperative membership significantly increases the probability of reducing fertilizers and pesticides of the family farms and improves net return per yuan CFPs. The further analysis shows that agricultural cooperative production services reduced the usage of fertilizers and pesticides, while cooperatives marketing services only significantly lowered the use of pesticides. Our findings highlight the importance of promoting the development of agricultural cooperatives to support green agricultural production in China.
A atual organização do espaço rural brasileiro tem se transformado devido às novas tecnologias que foram inseridas no campo. Neste novo cenário o campo tornou-se um espaço multifuncional e passou a ...atender diferentes demandas e ocupações. O objetivo geral deste estudo propõe-se apresentar uma discussão pautada nos conceitos e definições da pluriatividade na agricultura familiar, ressaltando a sua importância ao ser realizada por pessoas que vivem no espaço rural, uma vez que essa atividade é reorganizada no campo e contribui para a renda de muitas famílias. Os objetivos específicos tratam-se de: abordar os conceitos e definições da pluriatividade na agricultura familiar na dinâmica socioespacial do campo; e compreender a importância da agricultura familiar para a pluriatividade. As reflexões teóricas estão ancoradas em proposições de autores como: Sérgio Schneider, K. Kautsky e A. Chayanov. Articuladas com essas orientações sobre as atividades pluriativas foram organizados dados sobre essas atividades na produção da agricultura familiar para verificar se há correspondência entre o conceito e a realidade. Como procurou-se evidenciar no texto é possível afirmar que, a pluriatividade é um fenômeno em que as famílias agricultoras tradicionalmente ocupadas com atividades agrícolas passam a desenvolver outras atividades consideradas não agrícolas como estratégia de complementação de renda. Além disso, muitos assentamentos rurais podem apresentar uma série de fatores naturais, culturais e socioeconômicos, que contribuem para a realização da pluriatividade, como: a tradição do local, os costumes e o modo de vida do homem do campo, as categorias de produções, atividades agrícolas e as não desenvolvidas no meio rural.
Palavras- chave: Espaço Rural. Pluriatividade. Agricultura Familiar.
This paper investigates the effects of current rural financial credit on the operating performance of family farms and the effects of these differences in China. Using the survey data of two national ...family farm demonstration bases of Wuhan City, Hubei Province, and Langxi County, Anhui Province, in 2016, a three-stage data envelopment analysis model is applied to quantitatively measure the family farms’ operating performance. In addition, the Tobit model and the propensity score matching model are applied to empirically evaluate and examine the overall effects of rural financial credit on family farms, as well as the differences in the effects in different regions and operation types. The evidence implies that in terms of the overall effects, rural formal financial credit has improved the performance of family farms, while rural informal financial credit has had a nonsignificant impact on family farm performance. Moreover, the rural formal financial credit in Wuhan has had a better effect than that in Langxi. Breeding family farms and mixed family farms are more positively affected by rural formal financial credit than are planting family farms.
•Using survey data, we measure the operating performance of family farms in China.•Formal financial credit has improved the performance of family farms.•Informal financial credit has had no impact on family farm performance.•Formal financial credit in Wuhan has had a better effect than that in Langxi.•Formal financial credit affected breeding and mixed family farms more positively.
•Compares group farms that pool resources and individual small family farms, in terms of productivity and profitability.•Comparison is based on detailed data from author’s primary surveys in two ...states of India: Telangana and Kerala.•Kerala’s groups notably outperform individual farms in annual output/ha and net returns/farm; Telangana gets mixed results.•Factors such as novel institutional design, state support, group heterogeneity, commercial crops, underlie Kerala’s success.•Lessons learnt are relevant for replication elsewhere in South Asia and beyond, with context-specific design adaptation.
Is there an alternative model to small family farming that could provide sustainable livelihoods to millions of resource-constrained and often non-viable smallholders in developing countries? Could group farming constitute such an alternative, wherein smallholders voluntarily pool land, labour and capital to create larger farms that they manage collectively? In South Asia, for instance, over 85% of farmers are small and increasingly female. Potentially, group farming could provide them economies of scale, a dependable labour force, more investible funds and skills, and greater bargaining power with governments and markets. But can this potential be realised in practice? In particular, can group farms economically outperform small family farms? A rare opportunity to test this is provided by two experiments begun in the 2000s in the Indian states of Kerala and Telangana. Constituted only of women, the groups lease in land to farm collectively, sharing labour, the cost of inputs, and the returns. But the states differ in several respects, including the technical support the groups receive, and their institutional base, composition, land access and cropping patterns. Based on the author's primary sample surveys in both states, this paper compares the productivity and profitability of group farms with that of small individual family farms in the same state. Kerala’s groups perform strikingly better than the predominantly male-managed individual farms, both in their annual value of output per hectare and annual net returns per farm, while in Telangana group farms perform much worse than individual farms in annual output, but are equivalent in net returns. In both states, groups do much better in commercial crops than in traditional foodgrains, where the largely male-managed individual farms, owning good quality land and with longer farm management experience, have an advantage. The factors underlying the differential performances of Kerala and Telangana, and the lessons learnt for possible replication, are also discussed. Overall, the paper demonstrates that group farming can provide an effective alternative, subject to specified conditions and adaptation of the model to the local context.
Brazilian savanna (Cerrad) trees present high diversity, whether they are being used by fauna and traditional populations as food or medicine. However, little research has been done to evaluate the ...nutrient composition of different species relevant to society, which may highlight new uses of these species. The objective of this study was to characterize nutritional aspects of the laves of different Cerrado native species. Bromatological analyses (i.e. dry matter (DM), total digestible nutrients (TDN), crude protein (CP), ether extract (EE), rude fiber (CF), mineral matter (MM), and nutrient concentration were performed on five native tree species '(Inga cylindrical; Platymiscium floribundum, Piptadenia gonoacantha, Anadenanthera macrocarpa, and Dipteryx alata)' that presented potential for animal feed, according to farmer's reports. The chemical characteristics of the leaves of Cerrado trees were characterized and compared between them. All five species evaluated in this study showed nutritional charaterstics that suggest their potential use for animal feed, especially the 'P.floribundum, I. cylindrica, and P. gonoacantha' for their high protein value.
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