Knowledge transfer is a critical lever to increase a farmer’s return on investment from his/her land. Agronomic advice is important to understand and trial new inputs and farming practices as well as ensure optimal marketing of surplus crop. The AAF TAF experience with private extension models highlights key success factors for increasing the effectiveness and sustainability of extension services, including the need to attach commercial value to the service, bring together suitable market partners (rather than burden one player), apply modern management approaches for efficiencies (e.g. using mobile communication and monitoring technologies), the importance of recruiting and developing ‘soft skills’ in extension officers and the usefulness of performance based incentive schemes at the farmer and company level to drive individual performance and loyalty.

The right combination of quality seed, organic or inorganic fertiliser, crop protection products and adequate water can transform yields. However, yields alone do not drive commercial farming success. The ‘optimal’ inputs package will depend on the farmer’s economic, environmental, and social context. The AAF TAF experience with downstream distribution of inputs to smallholder producers confirmed that farming systems, no matter how small, are highly complex and vulnerable to risk. Input interventions targeted to increasing agricultural productivity need to carefully consider the impact on farmer livelihoods and ensure a more multi-faceted approach to optimising farmer incomes through input choices, rather than searching for ‘silver bullet’ solutions.

The ability of farmers to access working capital to pay for critical inputs and mechanisation services is a binding constraint to commercialising small-scale agriculture. In AAF TAF’s experience, AAF portfolio companies were not always willing or able to provide credit. Similar to financiers, although there was an acknowledged shared value opportunity, high risk and high costs in linking to smallholder farmers disincentivised lending. The AAF TAF recognised the need to work through both AAF portfolio companies and other market partners to de-risk lending to smallholder farmers; and that incentives were needed for less willing partners. It is on this basis that TAF explored the concept of a smart subsidy to unlock value chain financing. The AAF TAF implemented 6 smart subsidy schemes in four countries (Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Sierra Leone and Zambia) in the palm oil, soya, and maize value chains. The report shares the 3 different types of smart subsidies tested and associated experiences and learnings, assessing the results and opportunity for these to be replicated in future.

A major constraint to productivity for smallholder farmers across Sub Saharan Africa is access to draft power resulting in reduced yields, lower production scale, lower cultivated area and high drudgery. Typical demand side barriers to smallholder mechanisation include high capital costs and interest rates, unreliable aftersales services and limited market access. On the supply side, farm equipment providers tend to focus on larger equipment intended for commercial farmers that are unsuitable for smaller farms. However, AAF TAF research showed that certain market conditions are conducive for inclusive farm mechanisation with 1) increasing rural labour rates bringing manual labour costs to parity with mechanisation; 2) increasing adoption of basic agri-inputs; and 3) saturation of the large commercial farmer market compelling equipment providers to consider the high volume smallholder market. This paper presents key findings from TAF’s market analysis and early stage experience piloting a hiring model in 2018 in Malawi.

The opportunity for technology to enhance decision-making, increase efficiency and achieve inclusive business growth was identified in companies across the AAF TAF portfolio. In particular, digital data solutions to monitoring and information management were increasingly explored through TAF, either indirectly or directly, to achieve both once off data collection needs as well as meet regular monitoring and business growth objectives. This paper examines a selection of AAF TAF technology interventions to demonstrate the diversity of technology requirements and proposes key guidelines and principles for finding appropriate solutions.

Constituting roughly 4 billion people on an income of $1.5k per year, the ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’ (BoP) segment has significant purchasing power and represents commercial potential for small, growing businesses to diversify their channel mix and distribute quality products to the last mile. The AAF TAF implemented 6 projects across 4 portfolio companies in 3 countries (Zambia, Burkina Faso and Nigeria) related to BoP route to market. From this experience a framework of best practice guidelines is proposed for development practitioners and business leaders.