Overview
This project aims to identify pathways to achieving an inclusive and sustainable smallholder farming sector in Vietnam into the future. These pathways will reveal an understanding of needed farmer behavioural change and the incentives and associated supporting policy to enhance sustainable smallholder livelihoods.
Smallholder farming in Southeast Asia is undergoing significant transformation in an environment of global food shortages, the rise of agricultural markets in China, unfolding climate change impacts and political complexities in the region. Research shows that smallholder farmers will still produce a large share of the world’s food, but there is a need to understand how the production of food and other crops can continue to be successful while social structures and policies that support agriculture are changing or ineffective.
Recognising that agriculture and smallholder farmers will remain important to the economy of Southeast Asia, even if households continue to diversify livelihoods and move into new sectors, this project seeks to improve recognition of smallholder farmers’ contribution to regional food security, employment and natural resource management.
The project has the objective of creating a better understanding of current and potential farmer types and farming options, that will inform potential policy interventions for more sustainable farming, with positive impacts on poverty reduction and gender and socially inclusive farming livelihoods. The outputs of the project will support the Vietnam Government in future policy design and implementation, to address challenges and harness opportunities for smallholder farmers in a changing world.
