2SCALE Thematic Papers Not By Technology and Money Alone | Page 23

8. Tenacious sorghum
smallholders
win the pricing battle
by joining together
By Lazarus R. Yarima,
trainer-mentor,
Nigeria
Key themes: PO and Cluster development and PO-Firm relationship; Gender
Sorghum-Nigeria
PPP
The partnership is part of
a pilot project to support
smallholder farmers
to realise agricultural
productivity gains by
getting access to Nestlé’s
demand for high-quality
sorghum.
Summary
This story focuses on Nigerian cereal farmers’
organisations, and on one sorghum farmer leader in
particular, Danliti Kuki. Farmers are now being attracted
back to producing the indigenous crop sorghum, which they
had recently abandoned because middlemen did not give
them a fair price, and maize had become more lucrative.
Getting better organised and linking up with aggregators
from Nestlé, the farmers now get a better deal in supplying
sorghum for the company’s products. Soft skills coaching
has also helped women farmers to add their voice to on-
going negotiations.
It was another Thursday, market day in Bebeji, North Cen-
tral zone of Nigeria, where Danliti Kuki normally sells his
sorghum. Danliti had to travel 84 km since there were no
buyers in the town of Kuki, where he lives. As the truck
turned the last bend to approach the Bebeji market, Danliti
wondered if there would be another “battle” with the mid-
dlemen at the market. His mind drifted to the experience
of the year when he had to pay for storing his sorghum
for another four weeks. He’d decided to do this rather than
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paying the ridiculous prices offered by the middlemen, as
it was of course unthinkable for him to return to Kuki with
his sorghum: What would he do with it? Who would buy it?
More and more often he was thinking this might be the last
time he produced sorghum. After all, he could sell maize
more easily in Kuki and with modern varieties he could pro-
duce 18 bags compared to the 11 bags of sorghum on the
same farm.