Extraordinary And Plenipotentiary Diplomatist July 19 Edition . | Page 42

AFRICA DIARY
fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, etc.) and consequently low
productivity. Medium farms are those with landholdings from
5 to 50 ha. These medium-scale farms are in-between small-
scale, semi-subsistence production and larger-scale, more
commercial farms, making use of agricultural machinery,
from power tools to tractors and other external inputs. Large-
scale farms are thus, those with more than 50 ha landholdings.
In most parts of Africa, offi cial fi gures indicate that as
much as 90 percent of agricultural production is derived from
smallholder farmers, where the average farm size is about one
hectare. Because they are so small, not many can generate
enough income to keep farmers above the poverty line and
most of them increasingly rely on other sources of income.
Recent national statistics show, however, a rapid increase in
the number of medium-scale farmers across Africa. Medium-
scale farms are reported to control roughly 20 percent of
total farmland in Kenya, 32 percent in Ghana, 39 percent in
Tanzania, and over 50 percent in Zambia, and the numbers
of such farms are growing fast! Within the past decade, the where there are many large and medium-scale farms. The
smallholder farmers benefi t from being around these depots
and factories, as they off er ready markets for their produce.
The rapid rise of medium-smallholder farms is due, in
part, to an increased interest in agriculture, by urban-based
professionals or infl uential rural dwellers. A few of the
medium-scale farmers are successful smallholder farmers,
who acquired more land and grew their operations. The
majority, however, are ‘new’ to agriculture. They are middle
– high-income individuals, often professionals, entrepreneurs
or retired civil servants. Many gathered their savings from
non-farm jobs, bought or leased farmlands and became
either part-time or full-time farmers. Some retain their jobs
in the cities, hire managers to attend to their farms and pay
occasional visits. Still, others, are unemployed youths, who
choose to take up self-employment in agriculture, to make
ends meet. Traditional farming has long been associated with
poverty and a sense of inevitable hopelessness. However, a
growing number of young, college-educated Africans are
amount of agricultural produce that these farms contribute to
countries’ national output has risen rapidly. In some countries,
like Tanzania and Zambia, medium-sized farms now account
for roughly 40 percent of the country’s marketed agricultural
produce. Of course, the situation is not the same, across Africa.
In densely populated areas with land constraints such as Kenya
and Rwanda, smallholder farms still account for most of the
agricultural output. Medium-scale farms are on the rise mainly
where there is substantial, undeveloped land.
Medium-scale farms help improve access to markets and
services for nearby smallholder farms. For example, many
medium-scale farms either own tractors and other important
farm machinery (ploughs, harrows, harvesters, planters,
etc.), or they attract tractor rental providers, who now
provide mechanisation services to smallholders. To ensure
continuity of supply, large trading fi rms and food processing
companies prefer to set up buying depots and factories in areas fi ghting the stigma associated with agriculture, by seeking
to professionalize farming. They are applying innovative
and scientific approaches to increase yields, and show
that agriculture can be profi table. They are also making
constructive use of social media, to change how young people
see farming and agribusiness.
Another major contributory factor to the swift advancement
of medium-small farms in Africa, is the ingenious introduction,
and subsequent proliferation of innovative agricultural crowd-
funding platforms. Faced with the lack of available fi nance for
agricultural businesses from traditional banks, entrepreneurs
are turning to digital technology to access investment from the
general public. Equity crowd-funding is becoming a hugely
popular option to help farmers obtain much-needed capital.
Many young farmers have access to land, which they
are currently unable to develop for agricultural production,
due to lack of investment capital. Financial institutions are
42 • Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Diplomatist • Vol 7 • Issue 7 • July 2019, Noida