TRANSFORMING AGRICUL TURE THROUGH CONTRACTED EXTENSION SER VICE DELIVER Y SYSTEMS: THE CASE OF KENY A ’S AGRICUL TURAL PRODUCTIVITY AND AGRIBUSINESS PROJECT - African Crop Science Journal, Vol. 22, No. s4

The recent article: "Creating a fertile future for smallholder farmers in Africa" and published by The Guardian, asks what the most effective ways are to encourage development of smallholder farmers within Africa. Frederika Whitehead, who is the author, answers this very crucial question. She suggests that diversification, training, and working with the private sector are the main variables to encourage such growth. Whitehead argues that diversification is a high priority, in effect, it helps smallholder farmers in preventing economic risks of market collapses, and helps prevent land degradation. Yet, this is hindered by governments, as well as businesses that encourage dependency on fertilizers, as well as encourage them to grow single crops (see: above article). 

Further to this, Whitehead reiterates her interviewee, Marc Pfitzer, who is managing director of a non-profit consulting firm; that one of the main issues within development of smallholder farms is the lack of training. Pfitzer advocates that the private sector has a real incentive to provide adequate training because the farmers will then provide them with their products/ services. Therefore both parties have the potential for economic gain. 

Ngugi et al., in their journal: "Transforming Agriculture Through Contracted Extension Service Delivery Systems: The Case of Kenya's Agricultural Productivity and Agribusiness Project", verifies the inadequate expertise and diversification mentioned above. Further, they solidify the fact that the transformation of smallholder agriculture from subsistence farming to agribusiness focused systems is crucial to attaining Kenya's vision 2030 goal.

To counter this issue: The Kenya Agricultural Productivity and Agribusiness Project (KAPAP) is implementing an innovative service delivery model, which focuses on Community Driven Development (CDD), demand driven and public private partnerships through contracted Service Providers (SPs). With the aim being, that such a model will contribute towards increasing the productivity of smallholder farmers, as well as their income.

The implementation of the model brings together sector players as implementing agents; while the SPs alliance were competitively selected. The services delivered to the farmers' common interest groups (CIGs) include high level value chain interventions, such as organizing farmers for marketing, and connecting them to other markets, as well as other service providers. Payment of the service is achieved using farmer grants and is established through achievements of a set income benchmarks negotiated prior between the farmers and their SPs.  

A total of 109 service provider alliances were contracted within the month of January 2012 to offer services and expertise to 118, 865 smallholder farmers (Males= 57%; Females= 43%). They were then organized into 4,355 Common Interest Working Groups (CWGs), and after a time-span of 15 months, the achievements made through use of this model were substantial. 

The results indicated that the farmers had both an increase in production, as well as income. They earned a total of US$ 44,118 million at a service delivery of US$ 1,124,706, giving an econometric return of investment of 39.4 percent. To this end, the achievements made by the use of this model qualifies it for inclusion amongst other feasible extension approaches. The potential to transform the agricultural sector in Kenya, as well as other developing countries with minimal modifications, is of great significance altogether. 


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