This sourcebook appraises these instruments and considers their nature and objectives, their potential benefits and challenges and the approaches used to implement them. It also examines the practices that have led to both successful and unsuccessful outcomes. The publication provides a comprehensive review of the potential of these tools to enhance value addition, deliver jobs, increase exports and provide markets for new and existing producers in the targeted territories. It notes, however, that implementation of these tools poses a number of challenges. For example, planners and practitioners sometimes use them interchangeably, thus ignoring the specificities of the investments, policies and processes required, and their expected outcomes. The sourcebook concludes that these tools have potential for catalytic impact, but planners need to make sound choices that respect demonstrated principles and follow good practices for effective design and implementation.

This publication is a product of the experiences and lessons learned while implementing agroenterprise projects in eastern and southern Africa. A Market Facilitator's Guide is based on a resource-to-consumption framework, which is the central theme of the "enabling rural innovation" approach for rural development. This approach seeks to empower farmer groups with the necessary skills to make informed decisions for their economic development, based on an analysis of their surroundings, assets and skills. The methodology also aims for outcomes that are equitable, gender focused and participatory.

Published also in French and Spanish.

The 39th Annual Meeting of the Donor Committee for Enterprise Development (DCED) was hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Rome on the 14th June 2017. The DCED brings together more than 22 bi – and multi-lateral donors, development funds, UN agencies, and private foundations, to explore how to make markets work for the poor. Under the aegis of Annual Meeting, FAO organized a Thematic Day to explore the relevance of small and medium sized agro-food compan ies (SMAEs) in poverty reduction and the transformation of rural development, inviting representative of small and medium sized enterprises from Uganda and Ethiopia, and academics and experts on finance and agricultural value chain development. This report represents a summary of the proceedings by the FAO organizers of the Thematic Day.

Africa’s Development Dynamics uses lessons from Central, East, North, Southern and West Africa to develop policy recommendations and share good practices across the continent. Drawing on the most recent statistics, the analysis of development dynamics aims to assist African leaders in reaching the targets of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 at all levels: continental, regional, national and local.

Over the next ten years, the African rural space will be the theatre of profound changes as the activities envisaged for agricultural transformation are drastically scaled up. Increased food demand and changing consumption habits driven by demographic factors, such as population growth and urbanization, are already leading to a rapid increase of net food imports, opening a huge opportunity for the agribusiness sector of many African countries. Against this backdrop and in line with its mission to spur sustainable economic development and social progress, the African Development Bank (AfDB) in 2016 launched Feed Africa, a strategy that is intended to contribute substantially to the transformation of African agriculture by 2025, and to reverse Africa's dependence on imported foods. As part of this strategy, AfDB is promoting the concept of staple crops processing zones (SCPZs), which are agrobased spatial development initiatives, designed to concentrate agro-processing activities within areas of high agricultural potential to boost productivity and integrate the production, processing and marketing of selected commodities. As essential components, SCPZs include an agro-processing hub, a number of agricultural transformation centres (ATCs) and agricultural production areas. The ATCs are designed to link smallholder farmers to the agro-processing hub and are strategically located in high production areas, with the aim of serving as aggregation points to accumulate products from the community to supply the hub for further value addition, or to send them to centres of great demand for distribution and retail to consumers. This study has attempted to assess the feasibility and applicability of the ATC concept to selected regions in Zambia, Côte d'Ivoire and the United Republic of Tanzania. Findings from the field have demonstrated the potential of ATCs to address community needs and constraints for a range of selected value chains, and have helped to identify different ATC models that could work in each specific context.

One of the greatest challenges today is to end hunger and poverty while making agriculture and food systems sustainable. The challenge is daunting because of continued population growth, profound changes in food demand, and the threat of mass migration of rural youth in search of a better life. This report presents strategies that can leverage the potential of food systems to become the engine of inclusive economic development and rural prosperity in low-income countries. It analyses the structural and rural transformations now under way, and examines the opportunities and challenges they present to millions of small-scale food producers. It shows how an “agroterritorial” planning approach, focused on connecting cities and towns and their surrounding rural areas, combined with agro-industrial and infrastructure development can generate income opportunities throughout the food sector and underpin sustainable and inclusive rural transformation.