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Why the elite should stop imposing their expectations on smallholder farmers
Bankers expect smallholder farmers to repay loans at a particular interest. For economists, African smallholder farmers are supposed to master…
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How to move from ordinary to best agricultural practices
‘Best practice’ is not even a mouthful but what it means in practice remains unclear to many people who use…
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Making sense of African food baskets through territorial markets
In addition to being a source of nutrition and income, African territorial markets provide strong evidence bases for building local…
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African territorial markets are masters of conversational commerce
What makes African territorial markets different from other markets is that they are not just about financial transactions. They are…
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How weak institutional support creates room for opportunists in African food systems
Absence of institutional support and fluid data has persistently seen most African agricultural value chains invaded by opportunists who end…
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African mass markets as platforms for addressing hunger and malnutrition
What makes African territorial markets impossible to underestimate is not just their power to aggregate diverse commodities from every corner.…
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Promoting low input, climate conscious food systems through territorial markets
If agroecology is about rebuilding soil health, enhancing biodiversity and reducing dependence on costly external inputs, then African territorial markets…
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Africa can feed itself and also be a source of food aid for the whole world
The World Food Program’s 2026 Global Outlook projects 318 million people will face crisis levels of hunger this year and…
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When interpretation is more important than statistics
While collecting statistics through crop and livestock assessments is necessary, the most important missing link is interpreting and analyzing what…
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Webs of interdependencies keep African informal economies more resilient
When you see traders in African territorial markets like Mbare in Harare selling Kapenta fish (Matemba), soya chunks, plastic packaging,…
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Headaches and pathways of translating infrastructure into better lives
While infrastructure like road highways and irrigation systems continue to receive much attention, funding and media coverage, it has taken…
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How African territorial markets are quietly rewriting socio-economic rules
Being self-organized for decades has enabled most African territorial markets to write their own socio-economic rules in ways that are…
