GTI S Progress Report: Internal Mid-Term Performance Assessment, Smallholder Farmers

The project aims to contribute to USAID's overall goal of fostering broad-based, sustained, and inclusive economic growth in Ghana. A mixed-methods approach was used to assess the project's performance, drawing on both qualitative and quantitative data. Two surveys were conducted with 293 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMiLEs) and 481 male and female smallholder farmers. In-depth interviews and focus group discussions were held with SMiLEs, smallholder farmers, community leaders, financial institutions, and business advisory services providers to provide context. The findings of the internal performance assessment demonstrate significant benefits to smallholder farmers as a result of receiving increased access to finance and investment from USAID FinGAP. Key findings related to outcomes for smallholder farmers include a 25% increase in maize profits from GH¢ 885 to GH¢ 1,106, and a 12% increase in rice profits from GH¢ 921 to GH¢ 1,027 between 2013 and 2016. The proportion of smallholder farmers who received loans increased substantially from 9% to 32% in the period between 2013 and 2016. Land ownership for smallholder farmers increased by 19% on average in the past three years. Nearly half (43%) of smallholder farmers report that their household earned more in 2016 than it did three years ago, out of which 40% have invested in agriculture-related businesses with their savings, 30% in their children's education, and 11% have improved their homes. However, challenges persist in the agricultural sector where smallholder farmers operate, including limited access to markets and competitive prices for the increased food produced, limited access among farmers to assets and affordable inputs, and the continued need to improve farmer resilience and ability to cope with threats and shocks, particularly those related to rainfall patterns. Smallholder household farms are characterized as a household unit, or group of people engaged in farming, who have usually slept in the same dwelling and shared the cost of their meals for at least 9 of the 12 months preceding the interview. Households usually contain eight people on average, with the largest average household in Northern Region (13.13 members) and the smallest in Brong Ahafo Region (3.9 members). Most members (65%) are between 18-59 years and the majority have no formal education (73%), a percentage which is significantly higher than the national rural average of 33% for no formal education. Smallholders owned on average 19% more land in 2016 compared to 2013. The additional acreage was used for the production of rice (13%) and soya (6%). Most smallholders cultivate maize (77%) with little change since 2013, followed by rice (49%) and soya (19%) in the major growing seasons. Soya is the crop of choice in the Northern Region while rice is mainly cultivated in the Upper East Region. Between 2013 and 2016, smallholder farmers produced and sold more bags of maize (from 19.6 to 21.3 bags) and rice (from 19.6 to 21.3 bags) due to improved agronomic practices, increased financial support, and better linkages to traders. However, some farmers reported decreases in production levels for the same parcel of land, mainly because of high prices of inputs (fertilizers), inadequate machinery and storage facilities, and crop loss from insects. All smallholders ranked access to markets as the number one challenge facing farmers. It is followed by low demand for local rice since they were unable to compete with the price of imported rice from Asia. All smallholder farmers' crops are vulnerable to some sort of shock or threat primarily because of drought or floods (52%) and then low soil fertility (33%), and increases in agricultural input prices (32%). Across all crops, smallholder farmers employed 4% more full-time paid male employees and 12% more full-time paid female employees in 2016 compared to 2013 and increased the average monthly pay by 92% in the same period.