Agriculture in Africa is expected to meet the dual objectives of providing food and helping people to escape poverty. African agriculture is dominated by smallholdings and donors generally target their agricultural support at the smallholder sector. The expectation is that if the gap between actual and potential yields can be closed, smallholders will grow sufficient crops to feed their families, with a surplus to sell, thus meeting food security needs and bringing in an income to move them out of poverty. In practice, this is often not possible. While technologies already exist that can raise smallholder farmers’ yields 3 or 4 times, even under rainfed conditions, the small size of land available to them limits how much can be grown and the per capita income from agriculture is insufficient to allow people to move above the current World Bank-defined poverty line of US$1.90 per day. We link this finding with farmer typologies to further explain that there are large differences between individual farming households themselves in terms of their investment incentives and capability to benefit from field-level technologies that are aimed at increasing farm productivity. We argue for more differentiated policies for agricultural development in Africa and suggest that policymakers should be much more aware of the heterogeneity of farms and target interventions accordingly. It is important to understand where and for whom agriculture will have the main purpose of ensuring food and nutritional security and where and for whom there is the potential for significant increases in incomes and a contribution to wider economic growth. Let us recognize the distinctiveness of these targets and underlying target groups and work towards solutions that address the underlying needs.

中文翻译：

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非洲通过农业消除贫困和粮食安全：重新思考目标和切入点

非洲的农业有望实现提供粮食和帮助人们摆脱贫困的双重目标。非洲农业以小农为主，捐助者通常将他们的农业支持瞄准小农部门。期望是，如果实际产量和潜在产量之间的差距能够缩小，小农将种植足够的作物来养家糊口，剩余的作物可以出售，从而满足粮食安全需求并带来收入，使他们摆脱贫困。在实践中，这通常是不可能的。虽然已经存在可以将小农的产量提高 3 到 4 倍的技术，即使在雨养条件下，他们可用的土地面积小，限制了可以种植的面积，人均农业收入不足以让人们摆脱世界银行规定的每天 1.90 美元的贫困线。我们将这一发现与农民类型学联系起来，以进一步解释个体农户本身在投资激励和从旨在提高农业生产力的田间技术中受益的能力方面存在巨大差异。我们主张为非洲的农业发展制定更多差异化的政策，并建议决策者应该更加了解农场的异质性，并相应地制定目标干预措施。重要的是要了解农业在何处和为谁实现确保粮食和营养安全的主要目的，以及在何处和为谁有可能显着增加收入并为更广泛的经济增长做出贡献。让我们认识到这些目标和潜在目标群体的独特性，并努力寻找解决潜在需求的解决方案。