Millions to One Billion: How to Scale Up Agriculture Without Magnifying Problems

Expanding on the need to be more efficient—a growing theme of Forum 2012—the workshop examined how to scale up agriculture without making existing problems bigger.

Minh Nguyet Le, country representative from Oxfam America in Vietnam, talked about the work she is doing there which focuses on rice production and is based on the principle that small farmers can create big change.  Indeed, the project shows this to be true with participating farmers experiencing a $95-$200 increase per month per acre, all with a decrease in input.

“From the very beginning, we decided this was a long term program,” Le explained.  “Ten years.”  This type of investment has allowed them to go from being the driving force at the outset of the project to taking a back seat five years later as local partners take on more responsibilities.

Johannes Linn, nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said that organizations are so focused on making the current project work, they are too scared of thinking beyond it.  The panelists all agreed on the need to think strategically about development rather than being too focused on day-to-day survival.

“It’s important to underscore that it’s not a matter of growing what we have been doing,” said Brian Greenberg, director of sustainable development at InterAction.  Thus, scaling up cannot just be about expanding programs to new locations, spending more on programs or increasing program size.  Instead, local capacity building is a key element for growth.

Contributed by Jeanne Paradis