Agricultural Value Chains Support Project
The project’s goal is to improve the incomes and livelihoods of poor farm families in Senegal’s groundnut basin, where rural poverty has been spreading and deepening.
The once-vibrant agricultural region has seen a steady economic decline as a result of the slump in world groundnut markets, climate change and continued degradation of the land. The region has a potential for agricultural diversification, but most small-scale farmers are unable to enter the markets that are opening up.
The aim of the project is to integrate farmers into profitable value chains based on local agroecological potential. Its most innovative feature is its focus on consolidating local value chains as instruments for fostering broad-based, self-sustaining and inclusive local development.
It will help small-scale producers, including highly vulnerable people, women and young people, develop profitable economic activities through direct contracting between their organizations and market operators. The project will strengthen grass-roots organizations and help all those involved in the value chains play an active role in dialogue at regional and national levels in order to obtain easier access to markets and a more equitable distribution of profits.
The target group includes three types of producers within the farming households:
vulnerable small-scale farmers who have limited family labour, small and often degraded land holdings and a narrow range of income sources
women and girls and their organizations
underemployed young people aged 18 to 30
The project will also support market operators and others who can facilitate the entry of the target group into the selected value chains. The project gives priority to value chains on the basis of their potential profitability and their accessibility to poor farm families, women and young people.
Download the project document (french)
