Can value chains become truly inclusive?

Livelihood resilience is a critical tool for climate adaptation. It is even more critical for smallholder farmers whose livelihood opportunities are limited for a multitude of reasons. Increasing smallholder access and participation in climate friendly value chains is a key part of building their livelihood resilience and thus enabling them to adapt better to climate change. However, smallholders have struggled to engage in these value chains for a multitude of reasons which include but are not limited to lack of capital, limited land, balancing food crops vs cash crops and limited access to technology

This session will focus on the experiences of organisations working in Sub-Saharan Africa to make value chains work for both smallholder farmers and SMEs. The session will present experiences and recommendations on how to simultaneously address constraints of smallholder farmers and SMEs. Through this session, we will provide recommendations relevant for policy makers, implementing organisations, and donors on projects and policy actions that will support farmers engagement in climate friendly value chains and support their livelihood resilience in the face of a changing climate.