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Family Farming in Asia Sangmin Han

21 October 2014

Senior Manager

NACF EU Office

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Family Farming

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Family farming includes all family-based agricultural activities and is a means of

organizing agricultural, forestry, fisheries, pastoral and aquaculture production

which is managed and operated by a family and predominantly reliant on family

labor, including both women’s and men’s.

More than 570 million farms in the world, of which 88% (i.e. 500 million) are

owned by families.

Responsible for at least 56% of agricultural production

Family farmers work on a significant portion of the world’s farming land,

regional averages are:

- 85% in Asia

- 62% in Africa, 83% in North & Central America, 18% in South America

and 68% in Europe

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Family Farming in Asia : small-scale

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Major Challenges in Asia

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Rapid Globalization of the food sector and threats from large-scale

commercial farming and industrial production

Environmental changes brought about by climate change, floods,

diseases and pests

Lack of support in accessing markets, assets, seeds and technology

Farmers drainage with rapid industrialization and aging farmers

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Recommendation by IYFF Regional Dialogue

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Reform the legal frameworks and policies on access to land, gender equity

and youth in agriculture

Develop country-specific data on family farming, including roles and

structures of producer organizations

Institutionalize national committees with meaningful multi-stakeholder

participation, especially by farmers organizations, co-operatives, consumers,

civil society and private sector

Establish enabling conditions for producer organizations and co-operatives

facilitating their access to policy-making processes, programmes and

incentives that allow them to thrive

Develop a strong campaign to promote the IYFF

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Recommendation by IYFF Regional Consultation

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Women play a key role in family farms and hence programmes to address

gender inequity in agriculture will pay dividends in terms or improved food

security

Providing access to quality inputs, technology and services like extension,

credit and marketing will contribute to improving productivity of family farms

Value chain development and promotion of entrepreneurship will boost

economic viability of family farms

Promotion of global alliances for strengthening the potential of family farms to

address the zero hunger challenge

Providing family farmers with adequate financial and scientific support to

ensure food security should be the bottom line of all food and agricultural

policies of developing countires

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FAO-ICAO Joint Conference of Family Farming in Bali

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Family Farming in India

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In India, family farming is refereed to small holder farming i.e. farming on

the farms having size of less than 2 ha and dependent mainly on family

members for carrying out most of the farming activities

Out of 138 million ha land holdings available in India, about 86% (i.e. 117

million ha) is owned and maintained by small holders

Contribute about 40 % of the total food production and 78% of the total

agricultural production

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Family Farming in India (continue … )

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Challenges for family farming

Land and tenure security

- approx. 15 million farm families have no land

- tenure of leased land for farming is not fixed

- scope for land tenure security, land tenure reform

Fragmented Land Holdings

- size of land holding coming down due to bequeathing

- reduction in cultivable land

- wastage and inefficient use of costly farm inputs

Water Shortages

- dependence on rainfall & ground water

- unsustainable extraction of surface and ground water

- no access to irrigation water

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Family Farming in India (continue … )

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Challenges for family farming

Access to qualified farm inputs

- could not afford to buy high cost inputs like seed, fertilizers …

Low farm mechanization

- farm equipment and machinery not viable for small farms

Credit crunch & limited access to financial resources

- difficulty in accessing credit services

- dependence on private money lenders

Impacts of climate change

- increased temperature, water salinity, pest and disease attack

- shift in weather

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Family Farming in India (continue … )

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Challenges for family farming

Globalization challenges

- cannot take advantage of higher food prices being the small scale of operation

- cannot compete with the larger business firms

Limited access to markets

- poor access and control over market and market information

- weak bargaining power

Lack of recognition of women in farming

- contribution of women in farming undercounted

- agricultural policies and programmes not sensitive to their needs

Youths moving away from farming

- distracted by non-remunerative and non-profitable of farming

- interested employable in urban area

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Family Farming in India (continue … )

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Co-operative Farming

Due to globalization and entry of big retailers in India, contract farming is

becoming successful. Practiced by many private companies

However, benefit not reaching the small farmers, since small farms are not

preferred for contract farming due to high transaction costs.

Small farmers can get benefitted by organizing through co-operatives to do

co-operative farming

Co-operative Farming

- farmers pool their land or collectively take land on lease

- economies of scale in procuring farm input

- better bargaining power, better price realization of the produce

- can also integrate with contract farming by signing contract with private

companies

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Family Farming in India (continue … )

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Indian Farmers Fertiliser Co-operative. Ltd (ICAO member)

One of the prominent national level multi-state co-operative society of India

Largest producer and marketer of fertilizers in India

Have more than 39,000 member co-operative societies, out of which about

36,000 are small holders

IFFCO is playing a vital role in the development of small holder farming

and improving the lives of farmers in following ways :

- largely catering to the needs of fertilizers to small farmers

- promotional programmes & extension services

- save the soil campaign

- information & communication technology

- providing insurance facility

- providing warehousing & collateral management services

- providing access to commodity markets

- social and cultural benefit

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Family Faring in China

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Major Problems of Chinese Agriculture :

Farmer Drain : Migrant Workers

ex) 70% of registered farmers with age b/w 18 and 55 worked in the cities

(Wenshang County of Shandong Province, a typical agricultural area)

Aging

ex) 60-90% of farming work is done by people over 60

(Shanxi Province)

Land Abandonment : 5~10 % land abandoned through out the year

40~50% land abandoned seasonally

(Jiangxi Province)

Low scale Economy

- 0.61 ha/household (Nationwide), 0.22 ha/household (Zhejiang province)

Financial difficulties : lack of credit accessibility, high interest rate

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Family Faring in China (continue …)

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Approach by All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives:

Land Trusteeship

Total Trusteeship: give land to the cooperative and receive shared profit

- wholesale trust : with the guidance and recommendation from the village

council, a large number of farmers in a village entrust their land for a

reasonable long term to the Supply and Marketing Cooperative (SMC).

- pooling land : the fragmentary land are pooled together with industrialized

farming, management, harvest, processing and marketing

- share profits : The SMCs would bear the cost of land, and the profit from the

land were shared proportionally among farmers and SMCs with some

administration fee to the village council.

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Family Faring in China (continue …)

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Approach by All China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives:

Partial Trusteeship:

- whole chain service : SMCs offer the whole range of paid service from the

land plowing, sowing, fertilization, harvest, processing and marketing for

farmers to choose voluntarily.

- minimum service level : Farmers who would like to join in the trusteeship

program, shall paid for a minimum level of service from the SMCs as decided

by the SMCs

- discounted price : Farmers in the trusteeship program received the service

and fertilizers at discounted price from the SMCs, compared with the market

price

* Monitor of Trusteeship by Village Council

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Family Faring in China (continue …)

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Common Principles of Trusteeship

- voluntary participation

- paid service

- shared risk

- shared profit

- extended assistance

Challenges of Trusteeship

- concern about the long-term stability of trusteeship

- farmers’ lack of risk sense and contract spirit

- lack of fund to upgrade machinery and technology

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Family Farming in Japan

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The total number of agricultural management entities in Japan is 1,680,000, of which 1,650,000 are family management entities, accounting for about 98%.

While farm households have been decreasing, corporation management entities have been increasing. This is one of structural changes oven time. However, in terms of agricultural population, the center of Japanese agriculture is still family farming.

Year

Number of

agricultural

management

entities

(thousand entities)

Family farmers Corporations

2005 2,009 1,981 28

2010 1,679 1,648 31

Up down (%) -16.4 -16.8 10.4

Percentage (%)

2005 100 98.6 1.4

2010 100 98.2 1.8

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Family Faring in Japan (continue …)

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In terms of agricultural output per management entity, corporation entities are generally larger in scale: They are only 1.8% in number, but produce about 30% of total agricultural output.

On the other hand, family management entities accounts for about 70% of the total agricultural output in spite of relatively small management scale.

In terms of agricultural output, the central role of Japanese agriculture is played by family farmers.

Number of management bodies by sales amounts of agricultural products (2010)

Total

-1,000,000 1,000,000

-5,000,000

5,000,000

-10,000,000

10,000,000

-20,000,000

20,000,000

-100,000,000

100,000,000-

(Yen)

Agricultural management

body 1,679,084 989,202 442,557 114,342 74,995 52,411 5,577

Corporate 31,008 13,327 3,007 2,061 2,803 6,505 3,305

Family 1,648,076 975,875 439,550 112,281 72,192 45,906 2,272

Estimated agricultural output (2009, bn. yen/%)

Total Corporate management Percentage Family management Percentage

8,049.1 2,253.9 28 5,795.2 72

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Family Faring in Japan (continue …)

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However, family farming in japan is faced with serious depopulation and aging. The generation who has supported Japanese agriculture is now in the period of replacement.

Japanese agricultural population has decreased to a half during last 20 years: 4.8 million in 1990 to 2.6 million in 2010. The average age of agricultural population is 65.8 years old in 2010.

50-60 thousand people have started farming in recent years, but it has not caught up with the speed of decrease.

Family Farming Threatened by Aging and Decrease of Agricultural Population

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Family Faring in Japan (continue …)

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Decline of agricultural incomes is one of the causes of decrease of agricultural population and stagnated increase of next generation who succeed farming or newly engage in farming.

Net agricultural production (cost subtracted from agricultural output) was in the peak around 1990 and has been decreasing ever since. It has been decreasing by almost 20% compared to 1990 per farm household.

It is an urgent task to train farmers who can ensure enough incomes in order to secure successors/new farmers and maintain and develop agriculture.

Urgent task of training farmers who can ensure adequate incomes

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Family Faring in Japan (continue …)

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Today, JA Group promotes “Local Farming Vision” activity to envision and practice the future

image of local farming and lives with households or settlements getting together and leading

farmers and various types of farmers united.

This activity aims for making better community through expansion of agricultural production and

improvement of farmers’ incomes by ensuring the individual roles of family farm management

and through discussion in the community.

JA Group develops the nationwide activity to create communities where each person can play a

role based on individual family farm management.

• Fund for Farm

Accumulation

• Fund for Youths’

Engagement in

Agriculture

etc.

Local farming vision

Clarification of management bodies of

leading farmers and farm accumulation

Various types of farmers playing their roles

Creation of production sites with local

characteristics

Creation of abundant communities through

agriculture

Political support from

administration/

government

• Support for vision

planning

• Support for

accumulating farms

and business proposal

for leading farmers

• Organizing farming in

settlements

• Support for new

farmers

etc.

Business/activity

support by JA

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For further information on country details

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Please contact the original presenters

India : Dr. Gopal Saxena, IFFCO gnsaxena@iffco.in

China : Mr. Li Shun, ACFSMC coopshun@qq.com

Japan : Mr. Maeda Kenki, JA-Zenchu maeda-kenki@zenchu-ja.or.jp

Thank you for your attention