Commercialization of Smallholder Horticultural Farming in Kenya ― Poverty, Gender, and Institutional Arrangements

This study by an African scholar looks at the challenges of commercializing small subsistence farms in Kenya for larger markets. The author points out that agriculture and related trades are the major income source for many individuals and economies in Kenya and elsewhere in the global South. Globalization pressures to enter international markets, and population and poverty pressures to increase agricultural production, combine to push small farmers toward commercial operations. However, they are often unlikely to succeed there. The author identifies poverty, gender, and the current institutional structures as the major barriers. Women are primary farmers, but lack access to commercial resources, and the farm products traditionally controlled by women have low commercial value, while those of high commercial value are controlled by men. Other findings include that small farmers are leaving commercial vegetable markets for domestic ones or other ways of making a living as soon as their age or improved local infrastructure allows it, and that farmers who organize in unions or collectives do better than those who do not. This book is a technical analysis for economic development and policy students, scholars, and professionals. Rear sections reproduce the data-gathering instruments used by the author to conduct the study. Annotation c2015 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)

Beatrice W. Muriithi received her Msc in Agricultural and Applied Economics from Egerton University (Kenya) and a PhD in Agricultural Economics from the University of Bonn (Germany). She was a research assistant at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Nairobi (Kenya) and currently is conducting research at the International Center of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE) in Nairobi.