The power of value chains

Transcription

issue 16 October 2009
O
BR KER
Including the rural poor in global markets
The power of value chains
Rethinking state building  Shaping Europe’s international role 
Germany: A focus on global processes  Negotiating space
contents
O
BR KER
3 OPINION
Shaping Europe’s international role
Paul Engel, Simon Maxwell, Dirk Messner and Pierre Schori
4 On the website
Louise Stoddard
6 Knowledge democracy
Jean-Paul Marthoz
8 Rethinking state building
Fragile states require a new approach, one that is firmly rooted in
indigenous capacities and institutions.
Seth Kaplan
13SPECIAL REPORT
The power of value chains: Including the rural poor
in global markets
Global value chains now link producers to consumers ‘from farm
to fork’. How can small entrepreneurs in developing countries
benefit from these value chains?
14Empowering rural entrepreneurs
Anna Laven
17Engendering benefits for all
Linda Mayoux
19Beyond the retail revolution
Malcolm Harper
21BOOK REVIEW
Global engagement, local action
Donatella della Porta reviews Global Civil Society 2009
The Broker, issue 16, October 2009
The Broker offers knowledge of global development issues. The Broker aims to
contribute to evidence-based policy making and action by encouraging exchanges
between knowledge producers and development professionals.
The Broker is a reliable source of information for all those concerned with
development and globalization, especially in the fields of economics, human
security, governance, and science and technology.
The Broker is published bimonthly, with an accompanying web magazine
(www.thebrokeronline.eu) and email newsletter.
Editor in Chief: Frans Bieckmann, [email protected]
Research editor: Ellen Lammers
Web editor: Louise Stoddard
Editing: Valerie Jones
Research: Chris van der Borgh (conflict), Janne Nijman (global justice), Willemijn
Verkoren (civil society)
The Broker thesis project: Kim Brouwers, Marenne Mei Jansen
Editorial committee: Johan van de Gronden, Erik van Heeswijk, Bram Huijsman,
Mirjam Ros-Tonen, Kees Schaepman, Fons van der Velden
Production and website: Contactivity bv, Stationsweg 28, 2312 AV Leiden,
the Netherlands
Layout: Anita Toebosch
Photo research: Rutger Engelhard
Cover illustration: © Rutger Post/Inbeelding, Amsterdam
Printer: Drukkerij Holland, Alphen a/d Rijn
Publisher: Stichting International Development Publications (IDP), Leiden,
the Netherlands
Board of IDP: Louk Box (chair), Evelijne Bruning, Ton Dietz, Rajendre Khargi
The Broker is funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research
(NWO) / WOTRO Science for Global Development.
The opinions expressed in The Broker are those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect those of its publisher or funding agencies.
Readers are welcome to reproduce materials published in The Broker provided
that the source is clearly acknowledged.
ISSN 1874-2033
Issue 17 will be available in December 2009.
22Germany: A focus on global processes
In the future, Germany wishes to play a more significant role in
European and multilateral institutions.
Hannelore Börgel
26RESEARCH HORIZONS
Fishing for alternatives
The scope of fisheries research needs to be broadened to include
the people who depend on marine resources.
Alhaji Jallow
28Negotiating space
Agreement on preventive arms control in space could soon be
reached, as long as all countries choose to cooperate.
Ineke Malsch
31Masters of innovation
32COLUMN
Chinese puzzle
Erwin Bulte
2
www.thebrokeronline.eu
State building
Quique
This first report on The Broker thesis project features reviews of
the work of four students from Africa.
opinion
Paul Engel, Simon Maxwell, Dirk Messner and Pierre Schori
T
he decisions that are made over the
next three months will shape
Europe’s international role in the future.
The script that drives global policy making
is being rewritten, in response to the
financial crisis, climate change and global
security challenges. Meanwhile, the
institutions of the European Union are on
the brink of a radical overhaul. By January
2020, we will have new institutions, new
leaders and the outline of a new script. But
will we also be optimistic about Europe as
a progressive force in the world?
Tackling the three big challenges we are
facing – the financial crisis, climate change
and security – will require new frameworks
and structures for international
cooperation and providing what are often
described as global public goods. Europe
has special advantages. It works, or tries to
work, on the basis of shared values. It
offers economic, financial, diplomatic and
emerging military options.
Several new arrangements at the
European level have the potential to
ensure that Europe is a progressive force,
but only if six conditions are met.
First, the links between development and
other sectors must be made more explicit.
Some countries talk of this as ‘joined-up
thinking’, or strengthening coherent policy
making – in economic matters, but also in
Iraq, Afghanistan and other areas where
diplomats, soldiers and aid workers must
find ways of working together. In Europe,
the phrase is ‘policy coherence for
development’. In the Commission’s own
analysis, the Common Agricultural Policy
has been a prime example of the failure to
achieve policy coherence, as has
immigration policy. But Europe has actively
begun to develop joined-up strategies for
Africa, for example, or for specific regions.
Progress in delivering these strategies needs
to be monitored. Has the EU used all its
collective resources constructively to bring
peace to Somalia? How would we know?
Who is accountable?
Second, taking development seriously
means having a strong development
commissioner at the heart of policy
making. Too often in the past,
development has been a detail left to one
side while the ‘big beasts’ scramble for the
glamorous portfolios like competition or
trade. It is ironic that EU member states
have insisted on open recruitment
procedures for the heads of the World
Bank, the International Monetary Fund and
UN agencies, yet they allow decisions on
the appointment of EU commissioners to
be made largely behind closed doors.
Third, the development commissioner
needs the staff and the resources to do
the job. The existing arrangements are
fractured and unsatisfactory. The
instruments of European development
cooperation, which add up to nearly €10
billion a year, are split in geographic
coverage and ownership between two
commissioners – development and
external affairs – and have different forms
of parliamentary accountability.
Particularly intriguing questions are
whether the proposed new European
External Action Service will be designed as
a champion of development, and what its
relationship will be to EuropeAid.
Fourth, the European Parliament must
raise its profile on development issues.
The development committee has a new
chair, Eva Joly, a French Green MEP, whose
job it will be to rally MEPs behind a more
ambitious and comprehensive vision of
development, with a strong focus on policy
coherence for development.
Fifth, European development
cooperation has been characterized by a
high degree of accountability to developing
countries, and this needs to be preserved.
The EU–Africa strategy is jointly owned by
the two sets of partners. The Cotonou
Agreement between the EU and African,
Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) states has
strong arbitration procedures and is
governed by joint councils of ministers and
parliamentary assemblies. Europe must
strengthen its partnerships. Why, for
example, should Asian countries like India
or Pakistan not benefit from the same
kind of accountability structures as those
that apply to the ACP states?
Finally, none of this will make any
difference unless words and action come
together. The EU already has a consensus
on development policy, signed in December
2005, by heads of government meeting in
the European Council, but also by the
Parliament and the Commission. That
consensus affirms the central objective of
poverty reduction and of development ‘as
a central goal by itself’. The consensus
needs to be updated, however, to reflect
the changing agenda.
It is easy to imagine a Europe enmeshed
in its own problems, treating the developing
world as a threat or as a suitable recipient
of our charity, and relegating development
to a minor role as the handmaiden of
foreign policy. But in the coming three
months we have an opportunity to craft a
different approach.
1 To read the full text of this article, and
to join the debate on the future role of
Europe, visit www.thebrokeronline.eu
Paul Engel is director of the European Centre
for Development Policy Management,
Maastricht, the Netherlands
Simon Maxwell is senior research associate
at the Overseas Development Institute,
London, UK
Dirk Messner is director of the German
Development Institute, Bonn, Germany
Pierre Schori is director general of the
Fundación para las Relaciones Internacionales y
el Diálogo Exterior, Madrid, Spain
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
3
On the website
Over the last few weeks, The Broker
has blogged from three major
international meetings, providing
over 40 new posts, including reports
from the floor, video interviews and
cartoons. The largest was the annual
conference of the Development
Studies Association, at the University
of Ulster in Northern Ireland, where
researchers and practitioners
discussed opportunities presented by
the global crisis. The Broker also
reported from the opening of a new
centre of excellence at the University
of Massachusetts, USA, and from the
conference ‘Towards Knowledge
Democracy’, where participants
examined the challenges, and the
opportunities, at the interface
between science, politics and the
media (see page 6).
Passing comments:
‘We know that decisions are often based
on emotions, not on rationality. It seems
that the conference was just about rational
knowledge. To gain influence in decision
making we need both worlds. And this is a
rational statement.’
— Ben Verleg, in response to Hanns-J.
Neubert’s post, ‘When knowledge fails’.
‘What kind of New Labour nonsense is
this? Get some overpaid consultant to
assign star ratings to research so the
bureaucrats in Whitehall don’t have to
spend time thinking. What do they think
has been going on ... for the last decade?
Have we not got already established,
well-regarded services which filter through
the bulk of research produced each year?’
— ‘Ruth’, in response to the post, ‘A star
is born?’, on DFID’s proposed system for
rating development research.
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/blogs
By Louise Stoddard, web editor
4
Crisis and opportunity
In September, the Development Studies
Association (DSA), an influential group of
development researchers and
practitioners, gathered for their annual
conference, ‘Current Crises and New
Opportunities’, at the University of Ulster,
Northern Ireland. Louise Stoddard blogged
from the event, which examined the
financial crisis, the changing role of
institutions and the future of
development.
Many speakers gave video interviews,
including Robert Chambers (Institute of
Development Studies, UK), Andrew Steer
(director general for policy and research,
DFID) and Santosh Mehrotra (adviser to the Indian government). Participants were asked
what lessons had been learned in the past, and whether they thought this was a defining
moment for the future of development.
The conference included a session led by Chris Whitty, DFID’s head of research, who
was seeking reactions to an idea being considered by DFID which would award star
quality ratings to research. The ratings would reflect various aspects, including depth,
background and potential policy relevance. These ratings could be put into a database
and used by decision makers.
‘The issue of how to embed research in the policy process is and has been a key concern
within the development community for some time. ... Chris Whitty proposed a very loose
design on how to go about this. One member of the audience expressed concern that this
model would simplify a much more innovative and delicate process. How can you put a
value on knowledge? she asked.
‘Next was a gentleman concerned about the interpretation of research. Who would set
the standard? “With respect, in my experience the most ignorant people are usually the
most senior”, he said. “These are the people making decisions not reading journals, how
do we get to these people?” … The conversation then shifts to the importance of building
relationships with those supporting the most senior policy makers.’
Lawrence Haddad, DSA president and director of IDS, reflected on the issues raised in this
session in a guest blog posting for The Broker:
‘The debate revolved, it seemed to me, around which research questions one applies
such a mechanism to, and what that mechanism looks like, especially who does the
grading. On the first issue – one needs questions that decision makers want answers to,
and questions that lend themselves to comparisons across contexts.
‘For example, when does conditionality of participant behaviour improve social
protection programmes, and when not? Even this question is challenging to create an
evidence base for – what qualifies as a social protection programme? What does
“improve” mean? But other questions, such as “can pro-poor growth be proenvironment?” and “how do politics shape the use of knowledge?” [will be difficult to
answer, and it may be] potentially counterproductive even to try. On the second issue –
grading – it would be good to have peers reviewing, but perhaps in an open wiki-style
way.’
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/Crisis-and-Opportunity
© Edward Galagan
Blogs
Communicating change
Communication for
Sustainable Social
Change (CSSC) is a
new centre of
excellence at the
University of
Massachusetts, USA.
The centre will be an
international focal point for
interdisciplinary studies in the theory and
practice of social change. During the
opening of the centre The Broker hosted a
blog with contributions from Jan Servaes,
director of the CSSC Center, Robert Cox,
professor of communication studies, and
Donal Carbaugh, chair of the International
Studies Council. In a blog post for
The Broker, Robert Cox wrote:
‘I want to take a closer look at recent
public campaigns to illustrate what I mean
by the neglect of the strategic, as well as at
the discourses which, I believe, contribute
to this neglect: Michel de Certeau’s
insistence, for example, that tactics, and
not strategy, are the “art of the weak”, and
that social change agents are, therefore,
forever limited to the terrain of the
opportunistic and the temporary. By
contrast, I want to propose that we think
of the strategic as ... how communication
that is more strategically aligned can
enable a process of events capable of
influencing effects within a larger system.’
The decisions that are made over the next
three months will shape Europe’s
international role in the future. The script
that drives global policy making is being
rewritten, in response to the financial
crisis, climate change and global security
challenges. In the opinion article in this
issue (page 3), past and present directors
of four influential European institutes
express their concerns about the direction
in which these decisions could take Europe.
In the coming months, The Broker will host
a discussion blog on this subject, with
video messages, blog postings, debate,
and weekly summaries of closed forum
discussions on the six points highlighted in
the article.
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/CommunicatingChange
A picture is worth a thousand words
The Broker is pleased
to welcome
cartoonist Quique
(alias Enrique
Mendizabal) as an
in-house blogger.
Mendizabal, a research
fellow at the Overseas Development
Institute, UK, will use his cartoons to explore
various development issues and to share his
impressions of new research. Quique will
report from events around the world.
Innovation Dialogue
In November 2009, The Broker will blog from
Innovation Dialogue, a conference to be held
in Wageningen, the Netherlands, which will
ask whether it is possible to be strategic in
the face of complexity. The dialogue will be
shaped by insights from an exceptional
group of keynote speakers, including David
Snowden, founder of Cognitive Edge, Lisa
Jordan, executive director of the Bernard
van Leer Foundation, and John Young,
director of programmes at the Overseas
Development Institute, UK. Their inputs will
be complemented by workshop
contributions from practitioners and
academics dealing with the challenges of
change and complexity.
No magic bullet for Ethiopian
food aid
Resident blogger
Thea Hilhorst
recently visited
Ethiopia, and
continues her blog
focusing on
inspirations and
dilemmas she faces
as professor of humanitarian aid and
reconstruction at Wageningen University.
In a recent post, Thea highlights the
failures of the Ethiopian programme to
guarantee emergency food aid:
‘I spent the last week doing some
fieldwork in Amhara region … It is already
clear that the expectation that the safety
net programme will finally resolve food
insecurity will not come true. Very few
families have successfully graduated from
the programme. This should not be a
surprise … Nobody we met seriously
believes the programme will live up to its
expectations, but ... its reputation is
growing ... Another disillusion in the
making?’
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/Enrique-Mendizabal
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/blogs
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/Thea-Hilhorst
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/EuropesInternational-Role
Web2 savvy
Our newest resident
blogger is Janelle
Ward, assistant
professor of media
and communication
at Erasmus University
Rotterdam, and
author of the special
report ‘Social academia’ in issue 17 of
The Broker. In her blog, Janelle reflects on
the future of online communication.
‘I am interested in how the academic
world is adapting to web 2.0. Are
departments encouraging the use of new
technologies in the research process?
What about publication opportunities –
will academics continue to be evaluated
on their ability to publish in academic
journals, or will academia open itself to
alternative forms of sharing research?’
>> www.thebrokeronline.eu/Janelle-Ward
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
5
The Leiden agenda
Knowledge democracy
The Broker recently blogged from the conference ‘Towards Knowledge
Democracy’, held in Leiden, the Netherlands. We asked Jean-Paul Marthoz
to reflect on the blog postings and reports from the event.
C
onference organizers know how to put together a
programme of experts and speakers, and a balanced mix
of lectures and workshops. Conferences are rarely a model of
linear thinking, however.
Participants can pick and choose among the speakers, and
are alternately attentive and uninterested. Each one filters
and decodes the presentations according to his or her own
interests, background and objectives. The ideas they take
home with them are thus more a kaleidoscope than a true
reflection of the entire proceedings, rather like witnesses’
descriptions of a crime scene – they all have seen different
things and have been impressed by different features.
Seen through the eyes of the bloggers, the international
conference ‘Towards Knowledge Democracy’, held in
Leiden, the Netherlands, in August 2009, certainly fits this pattern. The conference attracted more than 500
participants from 26 countries, so there were indeed
‘many’ Leiden conferences. The blogs extend in all
directions, offering many different angles, personal and
professional. But there is nevertheless an underlying logic,
thanks to the two cornerstones of the conference: the
keynote speech and the proposals for future action, the
Leiden agenda.
Knowledge democracy
In his opening address, Roel in ’t Veld, chair of the Council
for Research on Spatial Planning, Nature and the
Environment (RMNO), framed the conference as a
challenge for democracy. ‘As the industrial economy has
been combined with mass democracy through universal
suffrage and later by the rise of mass media’, he writes, ‘one
might suggest that the logical successor of the knowledge
economy is a new type of governance, to be called
knowledge democracy’.
By Jean-Paul Marthoz, professor of international journalism at the
Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium. He is also a journalist and
writer based in Brussels, Belgium. 6
The rise of ‘media politics’, in ’t Veld believes, has caused
‘the political debate to become superficial and short-term
oriented’. It has also fomented populism and the ‘gradual
disappearance of checks and balances’. In such a context,
what roles will knowledge play in the transition to a
knowledge democracy?
The Leiden agenda strives to provide an answer to this
question. ‘From a democratic perspective, the development,
dissemination and use of knowledge [must] meet certain
conditions’, says in ’t Veld. It should be independent,
relevant for policy makers, credible, legitimate, pluralistic
and universally accessible.
The words ‘tension’ and ‘conflicts’ formed a constant
subtext during the conference. The tension between science
and politics was forcefully expressed in a cartoon (see the
blog) showing a politician saying: ‘Find me some scientists
who share my views’.
Blogger Georgina Aboud, of Eldis, UK, quotes Professor
Ellen Wayenberg of Ghent University, Belgium, on how the
knowledge derived from research is used: ‘Knowledge is used
when it suits policy makers, and is deemed flawed when it
does not’. The same applies to public participation: ‘policy
makers cherry-pick the participatory outcomes that suit them’.
In their reflections on ‘knowledge democracy’, most of the
bloggers’ contributions seem to have been inspired by the
philosophy of the common good, and so acknowledge the
need for a long-term perspective. Aboud restates the
recommendations of Roel in ’t Veld and Louis Meuleman
(RMNO) that ‘we have no right to make decisions which,
according to our present knowledge and values, would
impose on future generations such costs and risks that we
would not be willing to assume by ourselves’. If trade-offs
are inevitable, Aboud writes, they should be based on
‘balance; enough alteration in structures to create an
environment for change, without developing opportunities
for dangerous elements to succeed’.
Transdisciplinary approaches
‘Transdisciplinarity’ also appears to have drawn the bloggers’
attention. ‘I like the cross appeal’, Aboud observes. ‘It
enhance public participation in general. ‘Knowledge
democracy is about the sharing and creation of knowledge
in a democratic way’, Jansen suggests. ‘Through websites
such as Wikipedia, the power of knowledge is being
democratized’.
There is a danger that conferences such as this, where the
best meet the brightest, become elitist. The real world of
mass-media-induced ‘illiteracy’ increases the temptation,
since people sometimes reject ‘scientific evidence’ in favour
of urban legends or unvalidated stories on the internet.
Direct democracy
reminds me of Renaissance (wo)men who could switch
between science, technology and art in order to unlock
secrets and begin finding solutions’.
Roland Scholz, of ETH Zurich, Switzerland, is the ‘chief
evangelist’ of the ‘transdisciplinary approach’. He defines it
as ‘a joint process initiated by non-academics (government,
NGOs or industry) or scientists to work on an ‘ill-defined,
societally relevant, real-world problem, which includes
challenging scientific questions. Non-academics take
responsibility for the decisions […], while science takes
responsibility for the scientific quality’.
The conference was able ‘to draw together people from
different sciences and actually have them discuss inter-/
trans-/multidisciplinary research’, comments Pepijn Jansen
of Wageningen International. ‘These approaches have been
called transdisciplinarity, multi-stakeholder processes, social
learning, action research ... Of course, they are not all exactly
the same, but […] these processes are all about getting
relevant people around the table and letting them generate
new knowledge and a shared understanding about a
common issue, and hopefully also finding a way to deal with
the problem’.
‘The idea of co-creation of new knowledge is so different
from research’, consultant Geesje Kruit agrees. ‘It implies
system innovation and action! As Chris Peterson (Michigan
State University, USA) states, we should engage stakeholders
as our peers’.
There was a sense, however, that among these ‘relevant
people’, too many belonged to the familiar coterie of
science, academia, government or the media. Aboud
observes that this was a ‘very top-down conference,
predominantly white male academics’, while Jansen adds
that ‘I was hoping to bump into my neighbour or perhaps
the bus driver’.
Bart Jan Krouwel of Rabobank Nederland chooses to
focus on engagement with the corporate world. ‘Talking
about interdisciplinary knowledge, we need more integrated
partnerships between researchers and businessmen to
develop – together – more innovations’, he writes. But his
fellow bloggers are convinced that knowledge should help
‘History shows that knowledge societies are rarely
democratic’, ponders Hanns-J. Neubert of the European
Union of Science Journalists’ Associations. ‘Instead, they
tend to be technocracies. Knowledge alone cannot improve
democracy’.
‘Citizen participation’ became a conference buzzword: how
do we prevent citizens feeling they are subjects and not
agents of change. How do we include the public in the
knowledge process? How, for instance, can we mix
parliamentary and new forms of direct democracy?
At a time when growing numbers of citizens feel
disenfranchised, marginalized or excluded, the challenge is to
integrate them and their knowledge, says consultant Geesje
Kuit. ‘Not the solutions, but how to get them involved, or
interested, is the issue.’
Too much consensus is another risk. Knowledge needs to
be nurtured by encouraging ‘differing and conflicting views’.
‘The real challenge is finding ways of dealing with people
who do not share our values’, Jansen notes. ‘We cannot be
really innovative if we don’t welcome outside views’.
Experimentation is the name of the game. ‘Perhaps central
to this conference – and the idea of knowledge democracy –
is that we need to alter institutions and reshape ill-fitting
concepts, while experimenting with new ideas to see what
works’, Aboud concludes.
Some degree of modesty seems most welcome. ‘We
scientists are not very innovative in our thinking about
innovation’, Jansen comments after two days at the conference.
Hanns-J. Neubert ends on a sceptical note: ‘All the
knowledge available obviously does not prevent a democracy
from taking irrational, even stupid decisions, while investing
a good deal of society’s economic and intellectual wealth in
dead-end technologies’. He made this comment after fighting
his way through a traffic jam on his way home. ‘Democracies
still have a long way to go…’, he observes.
Well, now they have a new route map: the Leiden agenda.
□ www.thebrokeronline.eu/Knowledge-Democracy
□ www.knowledgedemocracy.nl
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
7
Fixing fragile states
Rethinking state
building
Although the international community has focused on how to fix fragile
states, none of its standard remedies has addressed the fundamental
problems. Fractured societies require a new approach, one that is more
firmly rooted in indigenous capacities and institutions.
M
any countries struggle with weak governance,
sectarian conflict and poor economic prospects,
unable either to develop or democratize successfully.
Although in recent years the international community has
focused on how to fix these fragile states, none of its
standard remedies – more aid, economic reform and larger
peacekeeping forces – has really addressed the fundamental
problems troubling these places. Indeed, such strategies can
weaken the already feeble ties between the formal state and
its surrounding society, exacerbating the difficulties that
plague such countries.
The political illegitimacy and poor governance that
debilitate countries such as the Democratic Republic of the
Congo (DRC), Sudan, Bolivia, Somalia and Iraq can be
traced to many factors – colonialism, for instance – that have
combined to detach states from their environments,
governments from their societies, and elites from their
citizens. Whereas a successful state uses local identities, local
capacities and local institutions to promote its development,
a dysfunctional state’s governing structures undermine these
indigenous assets. As a consequence, the state cannot
leverage its people’s history and customs to construct
effective formal institutions with wide legitimacy; nor can it
draw on the social capital embedded in cohesive groups to
facilitate economic, political and social intercourse; and nor
is it able to employ the traditional governing capacities of
citizens to run the affairs of state.
Fifteen years running businesses in developing countries
has taught me that international efforts to help these
By Seth Kaplan, who advises corporations and international
organizations. He is the author of Fixing Fragile States: A New Paradigm
for Development (Praeger, 2008). www.sethkaplan.org
8
summary
•Development projects are often designed around a generic model of
state building and implemented with inadequate attention to the
local social, cultural and institutional context.
•If their assistance is to translate into locally propelled development,
international actors must seek locally appropriate solutions for
problems of governance, land and resource management, and
knowledge transfer.
•If foreign assistance is to become a catalyst for state building,
Westerners must adopt a far more humble and longer-term
perspective.
•Helping underdeveloped countries should be about connecting the
state to its surrounding society. A country without an institutional
structure that its people regard as legitimate is unlikely to foster the
conditions necessary for development.
countries will start proving effective only when they address
these issues head on. As I write in my book, Fixing Fragile
States, fractured societies call out for a new approach, one
that is more firmly rooted in indigenous capacities and
institutions, and more likely to foster sustainable state models
built on legitimacy and social cohesion.1
The nature of development
Development is not, as the policies of Western development
agencies imply, a technocratic exercise in which poor
countries import an inflexible formula devised in distant
capitals. On the contrary, development is an organic process
that slowly transforms how the members of a society work
together. Although improvements in areas such as education
and healthcare can better prepare individuals to participate
in development, a country’s ability to advance is crucially
tied to its citizens’ ability to cooperate – both among
Hollandse Hoogte / Jehad Nga
Hole in a wall, Mogadishu, August 2009. For the first time in decades, Somalia’s leader, President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, has both widespread grassroots
support inside the country and extensive help from foreign governments.
themselves and in partnership with the state – in increasingly
sophisticated ways. Development therefore needs to be
firmly rooted in communities that possess strong social
networks, durable shared loyalties, widely accepted
institutions and deep reservoirs of social capital.
The non-Western countries that have developed most
successfully – China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan – have all
been able to make use of millennia of common social,
economic and political evolution, and all have strong
identities that are underpinned by some of the world’s most
sophisticated institutions. These cohesive groups of people
all have high levels of social capital, well established informal
mechanisms for working together, and deep reserves of
group affinity that could be funnelled towards national
modernization missions.
Outside northeast Asia, the countries that have achieved
the most progress in terms of development have likewise
been able to depend on the social cohesion and social capital
of people with common backgrounds. The most successful
countries in Africa and the Middle East – Botswana,
Somaliland, Turkey and Kuwait – are all built upon
traditional identities and institutions accepted by the great
majority of their citizens. In contrast, countries whose
governments are the least dependent on indigenous social
structures – such as Nigeria, the DRC and Syria – are much
more likely to have corrupt officials, illegitimate leaders and
ineffective systems of governance.
India is one of the very few exceptions to this general
pattern. At independence in 1947, it had an elite that was
quite cohesive because it had acclimated itself to the
relatively robust national identity and state structures that the
colonizers had nurtured. It was also one of the few colonies
with both the administrative and military capacity and the
transportation and communication infrastructure to govern
its territory.
Fragile states were born with none of these assets. To the
contrary, their colonial legacy is one of weak, inappropriate
institutions and a profoundly fragmented political identity.
Together, these two structural problems preclude the
formation of a cohesive population and prevent the
incorporation of indigenous institutions and capacities into
formal state structures. These countries were obliged to use
alien state systems that could work only if every member of
their heterogeneous societies learned and embraced the same,
alien culture – complete with its foreign language, laws and
ways of working together. Yet, the formal mechanisms of
those state systems were – and remain – far too weak to
compel such cultural reorientation, or even to win gradual
and grudging acceptance over time by demonstrating their
potency and impartiality.
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Insofar as they do exhibit potency, it is the power to
exclude rather than include. Many Latin American countries,
for instance, have for centuries distributed resources and
services inequitably while suppressing indigenous languages,
religions, judicial systems, land management schemes and
symbols of identity. The instability that has racked Bolivia,
Ecuador, Guatemala and Venezuela in recent years is in
large part blowback from hundreds of years of institutional
alienation.
The combination of fractured societies and weak
government warps incentives, encouraging short-term
opportunism at the expense of long-term investments that
could advance development. Society becomes obsessed by
the conflict between identity groups, not with generating
wealth or boosting national prestige. Meanwhile, formal
governing bodies and regulations, disconnected from the
informal institutional frameworks that guide people’s
behaviour, command only superficial allegiance and
compliance. Real life goes on outside them. State laws go
unheeded because no one acknowledges them as
legitimate. In such an environment, corrupt governments,
crooked systems of justice and weak property rights are
inevitable.
Somalia and the secessionist territory of Somaliland offer
one of the best contrasts between state building using
imported institutional pillars, and state building using
indigenous ones. The international community has tried no
fewer than 15 times since the dissolution of the Somali state
in 1991 to rebuild it in a top-down fashion – and 15 times it
has failed. Isolated from political realities within the
country, aid agencies, embassies and multilateral
organizations have repeatedly misread the country’s
political dynamics and forced upon it what political
scientist Ken Menkhaus describes as ‘unimaginative,
non-strategic, template-driven policy responses with little
relevance to the Somali context and little input from Somali
voices’. As a result, ‘Somalis seeking to extricate their
country from this deadly and protracted crisis have to do so
in spite of, not because of, involvement by the international
community’.1
In contrast, Somaliland, which declared independence
from Somalia in 1991, has built its state institutions by
adopting a bottom-up approach that takes advantage of longstanding and widely accepted clan structures. Offered little
external help, it has been forced to depend on its own
resources, capacities and institutions. Today, it is the most
democratic state in the region and has established enough
stability and prosperity to attract migrants from around the
Horn of Africa. Yet the international community refuses to
recognize Somaliland and persists in its Sisyphean efforts to
forge a centralized Somali state.
What Menkhaus has said about Somalia applies to many
other failed and fragile states: ‘These extensive and intensive
[informal] mechanisms [of self-government] . . . are virtually
invisible to external observers, whose sole preoccupation is
often with the one structure that actually provides the least
amount of rule of law to Somalis – the central state’.
10
The problem with international policies
Most Western policy makers and practitioners today pay lip
service to the idea that states will not prosper unless they are
built by local people using local resources. But the great
majority of development projects continue to be designed
around a generic model of state building, and to be
implemented with inadequate attention to the local social,
cultural and institutional context.
Many fragile states have political geographies,
infrastructures and governance capacities that make the
standard Western model of state building (with its top-down
state structures and strong emphasis on formal institutions
and methods of holding officials accountable) highly
problematic. Sprawling countries with diverse populations,
such as the DRC and Sudan, are unlikely ever to produce
stable regimes unless they decentralize far more authority to
their regions and find a way to take advantage of local
populations’ indigenous capacity for institution building.
National leaders have little incentive to serve distant areas
populated by disparate groups because they are viewed more
as competitors for state power than as compatriots. Thin
road networks, limited administrative resources and weak
nationwide societal bonds undercut the capacity of
governments to project authority and serve their populations.
In defiance of these realities, the recent UN-coordinated
programme to stabilize the DRC concentrated first on
national elections – at a cost of over US$500 million.
Unsurprisingly, stability continues to elude the DRC.
But even in more compact countries there is a need to find
ways to take advantage of indigenous capacities – and narrow
the gap between informal and formal institutions. Most
developing countries transact business, determine ownership,
adjudicate disputes and generally regulate their affairs using
informal mechanisms (this was true, too, of many of today’s
rich states during their formative periods). As the UK’s
Institute of Development Studies (IDS) has noted, ‘the
astonishing economic growth of countries in East Asia’ was
achieved ‘despite a lack of formal institutions generally
thought essential to good governance. Research in China
shows how informal relations effectively substituted for more
formal property rights in the early stages of market-led
growth’.
One of the reasons fragile states have such difficulty in
constructing effective systems of governance is that their
foreign-imposed formal institutions are weak, and they
conflict and compete with – and lose to – the informal
institutions that drive much behaviour. ‘Informal
institutions structure incentives in ways that are
incompatible with the formal rules: to follow one rule,
actors must violate another’, political scientists Gretchen
Helmke and Steven Levitsky believe. ‘Putting in place the
formal institutions that have undergirded the spectacular
growth of the developed world does not produce the
desired results’, explains Nobel Prize winner Douglass
North. ‘That is because the formal rules must be
complemented by informal norms of behaviour (and
enforcement characteristics) to get the desired results’.
Hollandse Hoogte / John Stanmeyer
The pattern established when the colonial powers arrived
and built their administrations on top of, and disconnected
from, local societies was essentially continued in most of
today’s fragile states at independence: governments are
largely divorced from, and autonomous of, the societies that
they are supposed to serve. In such environments, an
enormous gap separates a small cadre that manipulates or
controls the state, and the general population, who are highly
ambivalent at best towards their own government.
Western policy has if anything only reinforced these trends.
As a USAID report by Carolyn Logan concluded, the
‘political disconnection [that existed at independence between
state and society] was exacerbated by the economic
disconnection that arose from the growing availability of
external financial support. As the state became increasingly
dependent on these foreign resources for its survival, it also
grew increasingly autonomous of its own society and local
resources and so lost interest in that resource base as
anything other than a source of plunder’. The IDS report
similarly pointed to ‘the complicity of rich, highly developed
countries in the governance problems of poor countries and
to the need for external actors to take much more care about
the impact of their actions on internal incentives and
relationships in poor countries’. Abundant natural resources,
such as oil, when controlled by a narrow ruling elite, can
yield a similar result or exacerbate a society’s
dysfunctionality.
A new approach to state building
States deeply enmeshed with their surrounding society –
financially dependent, geographically appropriate,
institutionally synchronized and socio-culturally
representative – are far more likely to be well governed than
After decades of war and predatory
regimes, Uganda is rebuilding itself
from the bottom up. Villagers in
Rhino, northern Uganda, elect their
local council representatives.
those detached from their citizens. The peoples of Africa,
the Middle East, Latin America and Central Asia have
enormous political, socio-economic and cultural resources,
built up over centuries, that can serve as the foundation for
political, economic and social development. What they most
need in terms of outside assistance are innovative forms of
state building that take advantage of those resources. This
does not mean that conventional, Western political models
have no relevance to non-Western societies, but it does mean
that those models need to be adapted to accommodate
indigenous governance models, patterns of behaviour, needs,
realities and capacities.
International actors must place far more emphasis on
seeking locally appropriate solutions for problems of
governance, land and resource management, and knowledge
transfer if their assistance is ever going to translate into
locally propelled – and thus sustainable – development. The
goal should not be centralized states with Western-style laws
and a democracy defined solely in terms of regular elections.
Instead, aid agencies should strive to promote capable,
inclusive, participatory, responsive and accountable
governments, no matter what form they take.
One way to accomplish this is to channel foreign aid away
from corrupt and centralized governments and towards
locally accountable entities, both governmental and nongovernmental. Dambisa Moyo’s recent book Dead Aid surely
throws the baby out with the bathwater in recommending
massive cuts in Western assistance, which she describes as
‘an unmitigated disaster’ for the developing world.1 But she
is surely also right to condemn capital transfers that do
nothing except sustain African despots and stifle
entrepreneurship. Foreign cash has its place in kick-starting
development, but only if it is used in politically astute ways
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11
that reinforce the natural accountability mechanisms of
society, and that do not prop up shell-like government
organs unresponsive to the needs of their own citizens. The
debate sparked by Dead Aid has also called attention to the
fact that foreign assistance comes in many forms other than
financial. As development practitioner Carol Peasley points
out, ‘Good aid involves more than money. It responds to
locally driven needs and includes technical assistance,
institution building with governments and civil society, and
the training of individuals’.
Another change that Western agencies need to embrace is
attitudinal. If foreign assistance is to become a catalyst for
state building, Westerners must adopt a far more humble
and longer-term perspective. Teams of country specialists
should spend substantial periods of time in the field and
should live and work among ‘ordinary’ people rather than
alongside the elites and Westernized parts of civil society.
Doing so will give them the opportunity to discover exactly
how best to target aid to enhance a broad range of governing capacities, both formal and informal, modern and
traditional.
Indigenous institutions
From the Persian Gulf to Latin America, countries have
sought to bolster their legitimacy and effectiveness by
integrating various aspects of indigenous institutions – such
as land tenure arrangements, customary law and traditional
symbols – into formal mechanisms of governance. The
international community must encourage similar steps if its
aid programmes are to empower local people.
Literacy and training programmes – a major component of
some international aid programmes – would be far more
effective if they focused on improving people’s fluency, not
in one or another European language, but in indigenous
tongues such as Arabic, Hausa and Punjabi. Forcing
indigenous peoples in Latin America to learn Spanish, say,
or obliging non-Arabs in African countries to use Arabic,
often disadvantages – and even disenfranchises – large
segments of the population.
In many cases, the best chance for leveraging local
capacities and institutions and improving governance will be
to focus on building up local governments and tying them as
closely as possible to their local communities. In some cases
(especially in rural areas and small cities) this may mean
trying to integrate governing structures and laws with
traditional identities and social codes, and including chiefs
and village elders where they retain strong legitimacy. But in
many large cities whose populations are diverse and
increasingly divorced from their traditional roots, the best
way to introduce accountability into state organs is to
structure them around greatly empowered urban
administrations.
One should not idealize local governments. As James
Manor of the World Bank says, they are often ‘afflicted by
parochialism, factionalism, the danger of elite capture,
inequity and injustice’ and require ‘resources, support and
constructive initiatives from agencies (governmental and
12
non-governmental) at higher levels’. Even so, devolving
government functions to villages, towns and city districts will
bring citizens and government officials into face-to-face
contact, which in turn will ‘allow greater scope for
establishing trust, accommodation and a sense of mutuality
than do the more anonymous relationships that exist at
higher levels. The surviving human resources and bonds at
the local level provide a platform on which to mount efforts
at reconstruction’. For example, after decades of war and
predatory regimes, Uganda has sought to rebuild itself from
the bottom up by empowering local councils.1
Giving local – and provincial – governments greater
authority to raise revenue, and helping them build up their
capacity to generate and collect taxes, should make them
more dependent on local companies and other taxpayers.
Establishing various forms of iterative accountability loops
and decentralized democratic bodies such as oversight
committees, deliberative forms of public participation and
traditional forms of consultation can institutionalize
processes that tie the state more closely to society, thereby
making it more legitimate, more accountable, more
reflective of people’s needs, and more effective in the
delivery of public services. Over time, accountable local
governments in one region can be linked horizontally to
those in other regions and vertically to higher-level
governing bodies, integrating the more effective elements of a state and slowly changing the dynamics of a whole
country.
States cannot be made to work from the outside, but
outside assistance – of the right sort – is essential.
International action should focus on facilitating local
processes, leveraging local capacities and complementing
local actions, so that local citizens can create governance
systems appropriate to their surroundings. Helping
underdeveloped countries should not be about propping up
the state, but rather about connecting it – and making it
accountable where possible – to its surrounding society. A
country that cannot produce an institutional structure that its
people regard as legitimate – because it represents their
histories, desires and realities – is unlikely to foster the
conditions necessary for development. This basic concept
needs to frame all state-building programmes.
□ IDS (2005) Signposts to More Effective States: Responding to
Governance Challenges in Developing Countries. Institute of
Development Studies, UK.
□ Kaplan, S. (2008) Fixing Fragile States: A New Paradigm for
Development. Praeger Security International.
□ Manor, J. (ed) (2007) Aid that Works: Successful Development in
Fragile States. World Bank.
□ Menkhaus, K. (2008) Somalia: A Country in Peril, a Policy Nightmare.
Enough Project Strategy Paper.
□ Moyo, D. (2009) Dead Aid:Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is
a Better Way for Africa. Farrar, Straus, Giroux.
SPECIAL REPORT
Including the rural poor in global markets
Global value chains – the production, processing and
marketing of products ‘from farm to fork’ – now link
together producers, traders, processors, manufacturers,
retailers and consumers. Due to changing market
conditions and consumer demands, entrepreneurs in
developing countries are increasingly becoming integrated
into the world trading system.
Value chain development is a key concept in strategies to reduce rural poverty in developing countries. For
entrepreneurs, such chains promise a way to access new
markets as well as to add value to their products. But
value chains often exclude the most vulnerable farmers.
And those who are included often benefit only marginally
due to the unequal distribution of power, as well as
failures of markets and governments.
So what opportunities are available to small
entrepreneurs to participate in a global value chains, and
what are the bottlenecks? One strategy involves improving
knowledge and information flows to enable them to
‘upgrade’ their businesses. But real empowerment requires
much more: rural entrepreneurs need to become involved
in the management of value chains. Becoming organized
into cooperatives is one way they can achieve this, although
this presents its own challenges. Interventions to promote
value chain development will have a positive impact on rural livelihoods only if local power relations (including
gender relations) relations are taken into account, and if the poor themselves take the lead in defining what is good
for them.
In this special report, Anna Laven discusses what rural
entrepreneurs can do to upgrade their operations and
strengthen their economic power within global value
chains. Linda Mayoux offers a gender perspective of value
chain development, and Malcolm Harper describes how
small farmers in India have succeeded in becoming part of
modern, integrated value chains. Roldan Muradian and Ellen Mangnus discuss entrepreneurship in cooperatives,
and David Jean Laniel examines the implications of shifts in
international trade for developing countries.
Alamy / John Eccles
The power of value
chains
1 To read the full versions of all the articles in this special
report, visit www.thebrokeronline.eu.
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SPECIAL REPORT
Empowering rural entrepreneurs
Global value chains offer many opportunities for rural entrepreneurs
in developing countries to become competitive actors in world
markets. But unless local power relations are taken into account,
value chain development is unlikely to reduce poverty.
P
roponents of globalization have long argued that free trade
will lead to economic growth for all. However, since it is
evident that gains from globalization are not distributed
equally, NGOs and policy makers are promoting the
development of global value chains that include small farmers
and entrepreneurs, as a way to lift millions out of poverty. But
are they taking into account all the factors that determine who
benefits and who remains excluded from value chains?
Since the late 1990s, researchers have used global value
chain (GVC) analysis to describe various agricultural
commodity chains, including cocoa, coffee, cotton and
tobacco. Development agencies and policy makers have also
adopted GVC analysis to assist them in drafting agricultural
development strategies. Such research has provided insights
into opportunities for the poor to benefit from globalization.
But the findings of some recent GVC analyses are alarming.
Tilman Altenburg of the German Development Institute in
Bonn, for example, believes that ‘value chains become more
exclusive as small-scale producers fail to meet [the] rising scale
and standard requirements’ imposed by those who control the
chains.1 Many researchers concerned with the exclusion of
small entrepreneurs agree.
In the cocoa sector, for instance, it is expected that only a
few larger or more innovative farmers will be able to continue
producing cocoa for the world market in the future. Smaller,
non-competitive producers will be forced to seek alternative
sources of income. This trend is reinforcing inequalities and
threatening pro-poor development. To counteract this, and to
ensure that rural entrepreneurs can grasp opportunities for
upgrading, insights are required into the distribution of power,
both within the value chain and locally.
Chain governance
The issue of the governance of value chains is crucial.
Authority and power relations among buyers, processors and
producers determine how incomes are distributed, as well as
the conditions under which small producers are included in
the global division of labour. These power relations
By Anna Laven, adviser on sustainable economic development at the
Royal Tropical Institute (KIT), Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
14
determine whether value chains will have an impact in terms
of poverty reduction.
Value chains are part of larger institutional frameworks.
They receive external inputs in the form of knowledge and
they are influenced by advocacy groups (trade unions,
NGOs), and by the policy priorities of national governments
or international bodies such as the World Trade
Organization. They are also affected by social structures
such as the level of organization of producers, or traditional
hierarchical relations. These institutional frameworks either
provide effective channels through which value chains can be
‘upgraded’, or they create barriers that can block exchanges
between actors in the chain.
Agricultural value chains are increasingly driven by
multinational traders and food processors. They now
From complete goods to inputs
David Jean Laniel, trade analyst, Canada
Although trade has evolved in the last two decades, shifting from
complete goods to intermediary inputs, our understanding of its
dynamics has failed to keep pace. As a result, the policy options
conferred to developing countries that wish to industrialize in such a
context appear disjointed. Trade theorists still believe that the fact
that some parts of manufacturing processes can now be done by
small, specialized firms – the ‘slicing of the value chain’, as Paul
Krugman put it – is promising for developing countries. It would
enable them to develop a comparative advantage in an area where
they might not have had one before.
While appealing, this line of thinking disregards the firm and its
implications in a setting where the hierarchal power within global
value chains limits the assumed efficiency of transactions between
buyers and sellers. This cancels out two benefits for developing
countries: economies of scope and technological upgrading. Thus, the
trade in specialized goods presents a paradox. While it may provide
opportunities for developing countries to integrate into world
markets, it does not create the proper environment to allow for the
formation of high value-added, export-based manufacturing.
For the full text of this article, visit The Broker website.
Hollandse Hoogte / Jessica Dimmock
Young farm labourers harvesting cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire.
determine quality standards, and have the final say in linking
producers to markets. Through takeovers and mergers, the
multinationals have gradually increased the scale of their
operations, and in the process have gained considerable
economic and political power.
But with increasing scale comes risk. The introduction of
market reforms in many producing countries meant that the
multinational buyers of primary commodities were
vulnerable to the poor performance of their suppliers, and
thus became more insistent on controlling product and
process quality specifications further down the value chain.
Further factors that have led to multinational traders and
processors controlling value chains include changing
consumer demands, and the growing influence of retailers
and supermarkets. Growing numbers of consumers want to
know, for example, exactly where their coffee comes from, all
the way back to a farm in, say, Costa Rica. Some consumers
prefer to buy organic products, such as t-shirts made of
organic cotton, while others want to be sure that child labour
was not used to produce the products they buy. This
so-called ‘traceability’ is a quality management tool and is
increasingly used as marketing strategy for niche products.
Consumer satisfaction has become a common goal – and
concern – of all actors in many supply chains. Firms are
under pressure to ensure that not only their own companies
but also producers and suppliers throughout the entire chain
comply with internationally agreed industry codes of
conduct. As a result, international traders and food
processors have become more dependent on the local
suppliers operating at the bottom of a chain. This also entails
greater responsibility, in particular to provide producers with
the information and the new technologies they need to
comply with new production and process standards.
Upgrading
If small producers in developing countries are to cope with
the challenges of globalization and increased competition, it
is essential that they improve their businesses. This may
involve acquiring new capabilities that enable them to
participate in particular chains, or to access new market
segments, and in the process gradually move up the value
chain.1 There are various options for upgrading, all of which
require improved access to information and knowledge.
•product upgrading: moving into more sophisticated product
lines with increased product value;
•process upgrading: transforming inputs into outputs more
efficiently by reorganizing the production system or
introducing superior technologies;
•functional upgrading: acquiring new, superior functions in
the chain, such as design or marketing; or
•inter-sectoral upgrading: applying newly acquired
competences to move into a new sector.
Here too, power relations play a part. For weaker actors,
upgrading can be enabled or hindered by more powerful
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15
SPECIAL REPORT
From farm to fork: the numerous
factors that influence gobal value chains.
KIT/IIRR (forthcoming) Value Chain
Finance: Beyond Microfinance for Rural
Entrepreneurs. KIT Publishers,
Amsterdam.
players, including governments, and by existing social
structures. For example, research and extension services can
support cotton farmers in shifting from conventional to organic
cotton, which fetches a price premium. But the size of this
premium is negotiated between buyers and sellers, and can
fluctuate from year to year, affecting the decisions of cotton
farmers on whether to invest in improving their plantations.
The gains resulting from upgrading strategies are often
unequally distributed. For example, fair trade organizations
aim to pay poor farmers a fair price for their produce, but
membership of such schemes is often linked to land
ownership. As a result, the benefits of fair trade often go to
male landowners, and not to the migrant labourers and
female farmers who do not have title to the land they work.
Many development initiatives have attempted to benefit
small producers by shortening value chains. In practice, this
results in the exclusion of middlemen, who may also be poor
and may have difficulty finding alternative employment.
Thus the weakest actors in a chain often enjoy very few
opportunities to upgrade their businesses. However, as
Malcolm Harper shows (page 19), given the right
circumstances, small producers can be profitably included in
value chains.
Empowerment
In order to be profitably included in value chains, farmers
and small producers need to make their own informed
decisions about their work and livelihoods. In fact,
empowerment can lead to ‘self-exclusion’, if farmers choose
to remain outside or leave a chain because they foresee too
little profit and too many risks.
Chain empowerment means that farmers strengthen their
capacity to manage parts of a chain or specific activities. Two
aspects are important: who does what in the chain (vertical
integration), and who determines how things are done
(horizontal integration). Farmers may be concerned only with
production: they prepare the land, plant seeds, apply fertilizer,
control pests and weeds, and harvest the crop when it is
16
mature. But they may also be involved in activities higher up
in a chain, including sorting and grading, processing or trading
their produce. If farmers are involved in a wide range of
activities, this contributes to their empowerment. But true
chain empowerment requires that these producers gain
economic power by becoming involved in managing the chain.
Farmers can participate in controlling the terms of payment,
defining grades and standards, or managing innovation.1 One
way they can obtain the power to do this is to set up their own
organizations (see box, page 20).
Inclusion with and for the poor
Including the poor in value chains requires their
empowerment through improved competences, resources
and technology. Any GVC analysis should start from the
recognition that relations in a value chain are determined not
only by shared goals and interests, but just as much by power
and diverging interests.
Women workers and rural entrepreneurs are perhaps the
most familiar victims, as Linda Mayoux points out (page
17). The potential of interventions to strengthen value chains
and to empower small farmers in developing countries will
remain limited as long as poor women and men cannot
negotiate the conditions under which they want to
participate. As long as they are unable to do this, being
included in a global value chain can be a rather risky
business, rather than an opportunity for growth.
The author wishes to thank Bart de Steenhuijsen Piters (KIT,
Amsterdam) and Peter Knorringa and Bert Helmsing (ISS,
The Hague) for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.
□ Gibbon, P. and Ponte, S. (2005) Trading Down: Africa,Value Chains,
and the Global Economy. Temple University Press.
□ Peppelenbos, L. and Mundy, P. (eds) (2008) Trading Up: Building
Cooperation between Farmers and Traders in Africa. KIT/IIRR.
Gender inequalities affect the ways in which
value chains operate at all levels. Promoting
gender justice can result in a ‘quadruple
win–win’, benefiting women, men and
enterprises throughout the chain, as well as
national economies.
Hollandse Hoogte / Benoit Decout
Engendering
benefits for all
Production line in a chocolate factory.
W
omen are important as producers and workers in
most value chains, supplying national and
international markets with both traditional and high-value
products such as textiles, coffee and cocoa. Yet there is
evidence that women are often excluded from the more
profitable parts of agricultural and manufacturing chains.
Women-owned businesses face many more constraints
than those run by men, and have more limited access to
financial and other services. In multinational manufacturing
and agricultural chains, even where enterprises are governed
by ethical codes, there is often a division of labour based on
gender stereotypes. Permanent and full-time work may be
reserved for men, and women’s work is arbitrarily assumed
to be of lower value. For commodities like coffee and cocoa,
women often do most of the cultivation. But because the land
usually belongs to their husbands, women are not eligible to
join cooperatives or receive credit, and are not targeted in
technical training.
Fair trade and ethical codes of conduct generally only
cover permanent workers, excluding the majority of women
who are either part-time/casual workers or unpaid family
workers. The Common Code for the Coffee Community
(2004), for example, does mention gender equity, but does
not carry this through to a commitment to gender equality in
access to services or support changes at the household level.
Value chain interventions may actually increase such
disparities. Recent research by the World Bank, IFPRI and
others, shows that gender inequalities are a key constraint on
economic growth and a major cause of poverty.1 Value
chain interventions aim to contribute to poverty reduction by
making sure that workers and small producers are the main
beneficiaries of the upgrading. But most of the interventions
continue to ignore gender issues. As a result, gender
inequalities actually increase, which further contributes to the
high gender disparities on all human development indicators.
For instance, when chain interventions introduce organic
cultivation, this often increases women’s labour more than
that of men, but it does not necessarily increase women’s
control of income. Their incomes may even fall as women,
already overworked, are unable to reduce the time they spend
growing food, and so spend less time on their own economic
activities. Low incomes, lack of control over incomes and
gender discrimination in access to credit and training
reinforce a cycle whereby women farmers are unable to
invest in their crops or buy more fertile land, leading to lower
yields and inefficiency in production.
Promoting women’s brands
Many value chain analyses recommend setting up women’s
cooperatives in economic activities dominated by women.
Evidence shows that these are only likely to succeed if
women’s property rights and training are paid due attention.
Where this is done, it is possible to set up cooperatives, or
specific women’s brands in new or even male-dominated
crops, in order to establish women as effective and
competitive producers in their own right.
One successful example, from Peru, is Cafe Femenino, a
women’s coffee brand that was conceived in response to the
negligible presence of women in coffee producer
cooperatives despite their prominent role in production. The
programme pays the women directly, significantly increasing
their control over household incomes. By 2008, over 1000
women were involved in developing and producing quality
coffee. The venture has boosted their confidence and
increased their bargaining strength with more powerful
actors in the chain, including banks and traders. This then
has a spin-off effect in changing market perceptions and
conditions for other women both locally and nationally.
Not all women’s cooperatives have been so successful,
however. Many projects have been very maternalistic,
>
By Linda Mayoux, global consultant for the Women’s Empowerment
Mainstreaming and Networking (WEMAN) programme, Oxfam Novib,
the Netherlands.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
17
SPECIAL REPORT
attempting to shelter women from the market rather than
increase their integration by changing market structures.
Other women’s cooperatives have proved unsustainable,
either due to their lack of attention to developing women’s
independent entrepreneurial capacities, or because men often
take over as soon as they become profitable.
This shows that a major problem of women’s subordinate
role in value chains lies in the entrenched gender inequalities
at community and household levels. Setting up separate
women’s cooperatives can therefore only ever be part of a
solution. In some chains a better strategy may be to address
market constraints directly through policy change, and to
build up women’s individual abilities to engage in the market,
developing their own forms of collaboration as they go along.
Addressing underlying inequalities
Value chain interventions will have limited success unless
they address the underlying inequalities and discrimination
that cause women’s, and poor men’s, lack of negotiating
power and vulnerability within value chains. It is therefore
increasingly argued that gender mainstreaming is needed at a
number of interlinked levels, all of which directly affect the
effectiveness of value chain development.1
• Household and community: to address gender inequalities in
terms of power and access to resources, including rights to
land and other assets, incomes, division of labour, violence
and social constraints on women’s mobility.
• Markets: to remove gender discrimination in access to
inputs, land, employment and the ability to trade freely
and participate in management of markets.
• Policy level: to reinforce all of the above through legislation
backed by legal and regulatory systems, including for
cooperatives, property, labour rights, gender-based
violence, as well as improved social support through both
market-based and public services, and taxation.
• Institutional level: to integrate gender analysis into all value
chain analysis, to remove gender discrimination in access
to financial services (enabling women to graduate from
small savings and loans) and training, to integrate gender
issues into services for both women and men, and to
increase women’s meaningful participation in economic
decision making and planning at all levels.
It is frequently assumed that men are opposed to gender
equity, but this is by no means always the case. Women’s
empowerment and gender equity can result in a win–win for
both, as is evident from experience with the Gender Action
Learning System (GALS), a participatory methodology used
with 1500 coffee producers in western Uganda. The use of
this methodology catalyzed a process of community-led
change in which women and men developed their visions of
a happy future together, by analyzing the gender
opportunities and the constraints that prevent them from
achieving this, and developing personal and livelihood
development plans to move forward.
Women have used the GALS methodology to develop
business plans and market analyses, thereby gaining respect
from the men within their communities and building support
18
for their activities. Over 500 men have developed plans to
change their behaviour in relation to issues like alcoholism,
adultery, violence and sharing household work, and many of
these have been implemented. Men as well as women now
recognize that women do a large part of the work, and they
have come to question traditional power relations, even
addressing inequalities in land ownership. Transparency and
relations with local government have also improved,
benefiting the whole community.
The quadruple ‘win–win’
The experience in Uganda shows that whole communities,
including women and men, can benefit from value chain
interventions that take gender equity as their starting point.
But there is more to be gained. The benefits of a gender
focus to enterprises further up the chain are also
considerable. Where women are empowered and organized,
they are more able to produce high-quality goods and
manage their livelihoods so that they are more flexible to
market demand. In Uganda, Kampala coffee traders are now
seeking to deal directly with the women’s groups. In Kenya,
flower and textile exporters report that if their women
workers are happy and well trained, there is less absenteeism
and they have fewer problems in recruitment. Although there
will always be some conflict of interest between traders and
producers, and employers and employees, ethical behaviour
and developing good relationships and trust are now
established parts of ‘win–win’ supply chain development.
The challenge is to develop participatory processes, like the
GALS methodology, that can be implemented by enterprises
as well as development agencies, to negotiate win–win
strategies that incorporate gender concerns.
The final part of the quadruple win–win is for national
economies. When over half the population is not able to
work efficiently because of cultural, ideological and/or
political constraints, this inevitably undermines economic
growth. The productivity benefits of addressing gender
inequalities in value chains for major commodities like coffee,
where women do most of the work, should therefore be
obvious.
□ Farnworth, C. and Ragasa, C. (2008) Gender and agricultural
markets. Gender in Agriculture Sourcebook. World Bank, FAO and
IFAD, pp.173–228.
□ Solidaridad (2009) The Role of Certification and Producer Support in
Promoting Gender Equality in Cocoa Production, Solidaridad and
Oxfam Novib.
□ Mayoux, L. and Mackie, G. (2008) Making the Strongest Links: A
Practical Guide to Mainstreaming Gender Analysis in Value Chain
Development. Addis Ababa, ILO.
□ Quisumbing, A.R. and Pandolfelli, L. (2009) Promising Approaches to
Address the Needs of Poor Female Farmers. IFPRI Note 13.
1 For longer versions of this and other articles in this special
report, visit www.thebrokeronline.eu.
Beyond the retail
revolution
Hollandse Hoogte/ Gamma
The retail revolution is threatening the
livelihoods of millions of farmers in many
developing countries. But recent research in
India demonstrates that it is possible for small
farmers and artisans to be included in
modern, integrated value chains.
I
ndia is a country of small farmers. About two-thirds of its
1.1 billion people still live in rural areas and farming is the
mainstay of their livelihoods. But it is also a country of massive
change. India’s call centres and software houses, and the lavish
lifestyles of its billionaires, may be well known, but for the
average urban middle-class Indian one of the most dramatic
changes has been the long-delayed retail revolution. ‘Modern’
retailing – in the form of self-service supermarkets – has come
late to India. In attempts to maintain employment, the central
and state governments resisted change in retailing for longer
than in any other country. With these barriers now broken,
however, it is estimated that modern retailing in India is
growing at an unprecedented rate of 40% per annum.
Mismatched chains
How do modern retailing and the growth of exports affect
India’s small producers? There is a widening mismatch
between traditional small producers and the new multibranch retailers. In 2008 the International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI) warned that India’s farmers were
in for a ‘painful shock’ because modern retail chains require
large volumes of standardized products, delivered at precise
times and to closely specified high quality standards.1 These
large companies also tend to pay slowly. Indian farmers are
feeling the impact just like small producers in Malaysia and
Thailand did before them.
In India, such changes have already caused serious tensions.
Rioters have attacked and burned modern supermarkets, and
in Uttar Pradesh (home to many of India’s poorest small
farmers) the state government forbade supermarkets to sell
fresh produce. The protesters often march under the hammer
and sickle, which is still a powerful political symbol in India.
Marx seems to have been right: progress seems inevitably to
be associated with increasing inequity.
But India can never retreat to the economic isolation that
characterized its first 54 years of independence. There is an
urgent need to establish value chains that can include rather
than exclude the smallest producers.
Inclusive chains
It is commonly believed that it is very hard profitably to
include small producers into modern, integrated value
chains. The findings of recent research contradict this
assumption. The book Inclusive Value Chains in India
(2009) describes 14 case studies of 12 ‘farm to fork’ value
chains of fresh vegetables, cotton, rice, shrimps, honey,
coffee and broiler chickens, and two non-food products.
None of the chains were large, with an average of 4000
producers each.
These value chains were selected because the lead
organization in each case – a processor, an external
development agency, a supermarket group, a producers’
organization and an exporter – had made a deliberate effort
to include small producers. They may have done this for
business, development or ‘social’ reasons, or for a
combination of motives, but the results were the same.
Detailed studies of the small producers in the honey and
shrimp chains show that they significantly increased both
their incomes and assets as a result of being included in the
chain. Anecdotal data suggests that the other 12 value chains
have been equally beneficial to the small producers. Most, if
not all, have significantly improved their economic position
since joining the chain. Moreover, the volumes of produce
and the numbers of producers involved are growing.
All the value chains are now profitable and are in no way
dependent on subsidies or ‘corporate social responsibility’
>
By Malcolm Harper, emeritus professor of enterprise development,
Cranfield School of Management, UK.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
19
SPECIAL REPORT
budgets. This was achieved partly because it had to be. The
NGOs and other non-commercial agencies were operating to
fixed time scales, and were working towards their own
withdrawal. The commercial firms regarded any initial losses
as investments in future profitability, and worked to reduce
and eliminate them as they would with any new venture.
Crucially, they also understood that it was in their interest to
develop and maintain a loyal group of suppliers; if suppliers
dropped out and had to be replaced, the investment in
training and other services would be lost and would have to
be repeated with new entrants. Hence, it was good business
to ensure that producers were properly remunerated.
Lessons learned
These 14 cases offer a number of valuable lessons.
Appropriate inputs. Many livelihood and value chain
interventions are undertaken by institutions that specialize in
providing finance, or technical training, or marketing, or
administration, or some other service. Such institutions
supply the inputs that they have at their disposal, regardless
of whether they are actually most seriously needed. The
critical inputs provided in the 14 sample cases were chosen
on the basis of careful analyses of what was needed and not
because of pre-existing institutional prejudices.
Institutional support. The government played a minor role,
and in some cases existing government regulations had to be
removed in order to allow the value chain to succeed.
Government’s role was to do less, not more. Private
businesses, both small and large, on the other hand, played a
major role as customers, suppliers and often as the initiators of
positive and inclusive change. These companies made use of
subsidies when they were available, but they were not always
necessary; inclusive value chains can be good investments.
Independent management. Small producers are often
organized into cooperatives in order to achieve economies of
scale and bargaining power. There have been some dramatic
successes, such as the Amul milk producers’ societies. But
overall, the track record of such groups is not good. The 14
cases showed that such groupings are not always necessary.
Groups were involved in seven cases, but in the other seven
the producers operated individually. The systems for the
flow of inputs, information and products worked effectively
under corporate or other independent management, and the
producers’ share of the benefits was such as to encourage
them to remain in the value chain.
Comparative advantages. Success was achieved through
higher quality, rather than by lower prices. Small producers
were treated not as the ‘weaker sections’ (as the official
Government of India phrase has it) but as economic actors
with their own peculiar strengths. Five of the 12 food chains
were producing organic crops, in which small producers
have particular comparative advantages. Organic cultivation
requires an intimate knowledge of the land, which small
farmers have, and on-farm labour is often used for weeding
or composting, replacing purchased chemicals or other
inputs. The emphasis was on exploiting these strengths for
the advantage of all parties, rather than on protecting and
thus preserving their weaknesses.
The future
Entrepreneurship in agricultural cooperatives
Roldan Muradian, CIDIN-Radboud University Nijmegen/Agriterra,
and Ellen Magnus, Royal Tropical Institute, the Netherlands
Producer organizations such as cooperatives face considerable
challenges in developing the new entrepreneurial skills they need in
order to cope with global trends in the agribusiness sector. Forming
strategic alliances with development agents and private firms may
contribute to this process, but many challenges await those who are
willing to participate in such initiatives.
For agricultural cooperatives, the issue is how to deal with the
inevitable tension between engaging in new entrepreneurial relations
while also remaining an organization that is truly controlled by and
works for the benefit of its members. For the development sector,
the question is how to adopt a more business-oriented vision without
becoming part of the mainstream business. For the private sector, the
challenge will be to convince managers that social concerns are not
just a matter of building a good corporate image, but of adopting an
ethical approach towards society. Overall, the critical question is how
to mainstream partnerships between these three sectors without
jeopardizing social inclusion.
For the full text of this article, visit The Broker website.
20
India’s modern retail sector is growing rapidly, but it is still
small. Most farmers and artisans continue to sell their
produce through traditional channels, local vendors or open
markets, and only a few are as yet included in modern value
chains of any kind, whether inclusive or not. Yet modern
retailing will keep growing, and further research is needed to
ascertain the extent to which the benefits found in these case
studies can be spread more widely.
There are almost 92 million small farms in India, and
many more millions of non-farm artisans. The value chain
research discussed here includes a mere 70,000 producers,
and does not claim to be representative of India as a whole.
The results do show, however, that it is possible for small
farmers and artisans to be included and play a profitable part
in modern, integrated value chains. Marx was not necessarily
right, and progress under capitalism need not be associated
with increasing inequity.
□ Harper, M. (2009) Inclusive Value Chains in India: Linking the
Smallest Producers to Modern Markets, World Scientific.
□ Reardon, T. and Gulati, A. (2008) The Rise of Supermarkets and their
Development Implications, IFPRI Discussion Paper 752.
□ Shepherd, A. (2005) The Implications of Supermarket Development for
Horticultural Farmers and Traditional Marketing Systems in Asia, FAO.
book review
Global engagement, local action
Global Civil Society 2009: Poverty and Activism, edited by
Ashwani Kumar, Jan Aart Scholte, Mary Kaldor, Marlies Glasius,
Hakan Seckinelgin and Helmut Anheier, Sage, 376 pp.
A review by Donatella della Porta
W
hat is the role of global civil
society in pressing for a fairer
global order? The 2009 Global Civil Society
yearbook is the product of an innovative
collaboration between scholars from the
North and the South. It offers a
comprehensive analysis of recent civil
society interventions and a balanced
overview of struggles against poverty and
social injustice in many countries.
The question addressed by the various
contributors is whether global civil society
is actually advancing the struggle against
poverty, or whether it is helping to
maintain a system of which poverty is a
part. To answer this question, the authors
look at methodological as well as
substantial, and normative as well
empirical aspects of impoverishment.
The first chapter reflects on the
conceptualization and measurement of
poverty, and challenges current definitions.
The authors point to the bias that is
inevitable when a conceptualization of
poverty that is linked to European history
is applied to other contexts. The crux of
the matter is that those who have the
power to define what poverty is, also have
the power to define its causes and assign
responsibility for its solution.
Sally Stares then points to the
limitations of monetary measurements of
poverty, and the important role of civil
society in developing different indices,
based on alternative knowledge. She
praises several civil society actors who have
created new measurements and new,
participatory ways to collect data. The
NGO Social Watch, for instance, developed
the Basic Capabilities Index, based on the
notion that living in poverty means not
having basic capabilities, such as freedom
and the ability to participate in social life,
as a result of having inadequate food,
education, sanitation or shelter.
The yearbook shows that poverty is no
longer a defining feature of Southern
countries alone. Globalization has
produced both extreme impoverishment in
the North, and rich enclaves in some cities
in the South. Impoverishment – and not
just poverty – should therefore be analyzed
as the destitution that results when
certain actors deny others their human
rights. The contributors focus on women,
migrants and indigenous peoples – groups
that represent a large proportion of the
‘poor’ in both the North and the South.
Existing definitions of poverty tend to
imply that the poor themselves are
responsible for their condition and for their
limited capacity to organize against it.
Challenging this view, some contributors
present poor people as actively resisting
poverty and as agents of deepening
democracy. Others focus on the tendency
of local groups to ‘go global’ and build
transnational alliances. Examples include
the World Forum of Fish Harvesters and
Fishworkers, the Campaign for Survival and
Dignity, which is fighting for recognition of
the rights of tribal and forest
communities, and the alliances of NGOs
that have challenged many large dam
projects financed by the World Bank.
Civil society organizations use different
strategies to address politics within
different policy areas, with some accepting
and others challenging the dominant views.
Among them, some cleavages have
emerged with regard to organizational
formats, action strategies and both the
diagnosis and prognosis of poverty.
Development NGOs, for example, are
divided into those that coordinate
professional advocacy interventions (such as
Oxfam) and those that focus on organizing
the poor ‘from below’, such as Shack/Slum
Dwellers International. Similar tensions have
emerged in the world of labour rights,
between the vertical organization of the
International Trade Union Confederation
and the horizontal community organizing of
StreetNet International, a global alliance of
informal street traders.
The final answer to the question of
whether global civil society is effective in
combating poverty has to be a nuanced
one. While several victories can be singled
out at the level of national policies as well
as international norms, the impact of
specific NGO interventions on poverty
alleviation, as well as on sensitizing global
public opinion, are much more difficult to
assess. For the moment, their major
contribution seems to be the
empowerment of the poor, and their
growing capacity to make their voices
heard.
1 For a longer version of this review,
visit www.thebrokeronline.eu.
Donatella della Porta is professor of
sociology at the European University Institute,
Florence, Italy.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
21
German development cooperation
A focus on global
processes
For many years Germany has focused on providing technical assistance
and bringing peace and security to many developing and newly
independent states. It now wishes to play a more significant role in
European and multilateral institutions.
Alamy / Victor Watts
T
he young Federal
Republic of Germany
made its first donation to a
United Nations development
programme in 1952. The
trauma of war and
reconstruction, the
reintegration of millions of refugees, and the country’s
reliance on Marshall Fund aid had all helped to sensitize
politicians to the plight of developing countries. The German
parliament introduced an active North–South policy, with
support in the form of technical aid, vocational training and
further education, as well as programmes to build cultural
and social relationships between Germany and the
developing world.
For the generation of West Germans who began their
professional lives in the 1960s and 1970s, development aid
and working in the ‘Third World’ were an opportunity to
show that there was a Germany very different from Nazi
Germany, which had left Europe devastated. In 1956, the
parliament included 50 million marks (about €25 million) in
the budget of the Federal Foreign Office for ‘supporting
activities for underdeveloped countries’. Five years later, the
republic created the federal Ministry for Economic
Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
The Cold War and beyond
Between 1961 and 1989, development policy was greatly
influenced by the Cold War. Germany was not alone in more
By Hannelore Börgel, a development consultant and analyst based in
Berlin, Germany, who since 2000 has worked mainly in regions affected
by crisis and conflict.
22
summary
• W
ith the end of the Cold War and reunification, Germany
turned its attention to assist former Soviet states, affecting its
involvement in Africa.
• Partly in response to 9/11, the coherence of foreign, trade, security
and development policies is now seen as essential for sustainable
global development.
• As well as programmes in partner countries, Germany also focuses
on nine out of 15 ‘anchor states’, each of which plays a key role in
the stability of their region.
• Although involved in the development efforts of many European
and multilateral institutions, Germany has so far played a minor
role in their governance. This situation is set to change.
or less neglecting newly independent Third World countries
that sympathized with communism. The social–liberal
coalition headed by Willy Brandt (1968–74) emphasized the
interests of the developing countries and long-term country
programmes, but this was followed by a phase of
pragmatism. In the wake of the oil price crisis in 1973, the
economic interests of the industrialized countries became
more important again.
In the mid-1980s, Germany introduced the idea of policy
dialogue, the aim of which was, and still is, to influence the
policies of developing countries and their elites, and to reach
agreement with the government on a political, economic and
social framework. Although the volume and content of
development assistance still depend on the outcome of such
policy dialogues, in practice they are also influenced by the
partner country’s strategic importance.
Following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold
War and German reunification had a strong impact on
development policy. Projects in the former Soviet republics
development policies is regarded as essential to achieve
sustainable global development – the key term being
‘sustainability’.
In June 2008, the government published its first white
paper, Auf dem Weg in die Eine Welt (Towards One World). It
describes the four main principles that currently guide its
development cooperation – to reduce poverty worldwide,
protect the natural environment, build peace and democracy,
and promote equitable forms of globalization – as well as
strategies for implementation.1
Germany today provides bilateral assistance to some 60
developing countries, down from 120 in 1998. Other
countries will also receive assistance as part of regional
programmes or projects dealing with specific sectors (such as
HIV/AIDS, climate change, forest protection and crisis
prevention), or through Germany’s contributions to the
programmes of the European Union and multilateral
organizations. Africa will remain the main recipient of
German development cooperation.
ANP / Andreas Altwein
Coherence
Joschka Fischer, former foreign minister and leader of Die Grünen.
Germany’s involvement in the war on terror caused heated debates about
the relationship between development and military intervention.
in Central Asia were integrated into Germany’s
development programmes. Some of these newly
independent states, such as Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan,
were close to collapse, requiring emergency aid – later
called development-oriented emergency aid – to provide
their citizens with food and other basic needs. Germany
assigned a special budget to this.
As civil wars erupted in several former Soviet republics,
including Tajikistan, it became obvious that development
and security could no longer be separated. In 1993, the
German chapter of the Society for International
Development (SID) and the German parliament jointly
organized a conference on development and security for
European parliamentarians. A year later, ‘human security’
was chosen as the theme of the UNDP’s Human Development
Report, and it also became the guideline for German
development policy.
21st century aid
Partly in response to the terrorist attacks of 11 September
2001, the role of development in the early 21st century has
changed. In Germany, development policy is now
understood to mean global structural and peace policy as
well. The coherence of foreign, trade, security and
How to achieve policy coherence has been the subject of
many recent discussions between the BMZ and various
federal ministries, including those of economics, finance,
agriculture and the environment, and the Foreign Office. To
inform these discussions, the German Development Institute
(DIE/GDI) conducted a study of policy coherence for
development from a more general perspective, based on an
analysis of international experiences. The report concluded
that policy coherence is a complex management task in light
of the current limitations of development policy, such as its
limited influence on other policies, as well as its small budget.
Compared with other donor countries, however,
Germany’s efforts to improve coherence have yielded some
positive results, according to the OECD’s Development
Assistance Committee (DAC) in its recent peer review. The
DAC found several favourable conditions for this, including
the government’s official acknowledgement of the need for
policy coherence, the existence of an independent ministry
(BMZ) with a cabinet level minister, and practical
experiences in achieving coherence at various levels.
German development policy aims to help shape
globalization in such a way that it meets the social,
environmental and human needs of all peoples. Today, much
more than in the past, the development opportunities
available to countries in the South are influenced by climate
change, international financial markets, technological
progress, and international institutions. Germany therefore
supports the new global partnership between industrialized
and developing countries, which advocates strengthening the
influence of the developing countries within international
bodies such as the World Bank and IMF, and promotes fair
working conditions and the introduction of International
Labour Organization norms worldwide.
The fact that influencing global processes has become
more important in official German development policy than
the implementation of projects and programmes has led to
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
>
23
Reuters / Roberto Jayme
Chancellor Angela Merkel and Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
after signing a strategic partnership agreement in May 2008.
intense debate. Supporting this trend are the various think
tanks, led by the German Development Institute. On the
other side, experienced practitioners and analysts believe that
development will only have an impact when all ‘target
groups’ – down to the village level – play an active part in the
process. They argue that such bottom-up approaches cannot
be left to the sole responsibility of NGOs or emergency aid,
but require official support. The ‘global process’ defenders
currently have the lead in the debate, and in recent panel
discussions they have dismissed, or sometimes even mocked,
those with opposing views.
Germany’s involvement in Afghanistan in the aftermath of
9/11 has given rise to heated debates about the relationship
between development and military intervention. Contradictory
official statements have contributed to blurred public
perceptions about the role of the army. During the early stages
of engagement, the role of the army was described as similar to
that of a civilian reconstruction team in uniform. German
development experts and NGOs kept their distance. The
north of Afghanistan, which is assigned to the responsibility of
the German army, was described as more or less peaceful, and
German troops were said to have a good reputation among the
local population. But this situation has changed, especially in
Kunduz province, where the army is fighting the Taliban. In
the meantime, in the more peaceful northern provinces,
Afghans are enjoying the first results of the reconstruction
work. Economic activities, trading and transportation have
improved, but many are afraid that the Taliban may return.
Among the German public a more realistic view of the
possibilities of development cooperation in areas of conflict
and crisis has slowly taken root. Die Linken (the Left) is the
only party that insists on the immediate removal of German
forces from Afghanistan.
As in other countries, the German media have tended to
report spectacular events such as suicide bombings, rather
than the successes of reconstruction. They have ignored, for
example, the success of the Afghan National Solidarity
Programme in taking the first steps towards establishing
bottom-up processes such as development councils at district
and village levels. There have been very few reports of the
provincial and district development funds, financed by
German aid, or the fact that Afghans and Germans are
working side by side to decide how to apply them. It is only
recently that the German public has started to realize that it
is impossible to eradicate the consequences of almost 30
years of war in Afghanistan in just five years.
Anchor states
Development or security?
The aim of all German involvement in developing countries
is to achieve societal and institutional change. In a 2007
strategy paper, the BMZ outlined a range of approaches that
can be used in dealing with difficult governance situations.1
Germany assists its partner countries to address the
structural causes of conflicts and to adopt measures to
prevent their escalation to full-blown crises at an early stage.
It supports both governments and civil society actors in
non-violent means of conflict management, with
comprehensive programmes to ensure the participation of a
wide range of social groups.
Through the Civil Peace Service, established in 1999,
Germany provides specially trained experts who work
together with local organizations and initiatives to mediate in
conflicts, and to raise public awareness of the concerns of
disadvantaged groups. They are also involved in the
rehabilitation of former combatants, helping them to return
to civilian life, working with traumatized victims of violence,
and assisting refugees to return to their homes.
24
Apart from its programmes in partner countries, German
development cooperation also focuses on nine of the 15
so-called ‘anchor states’, each of which plays a key role in the
political and economic stability of their region. These states
are regarded as indispensable partners in addressing global
challenges such as poverty reduction, climate change and
environmental protection, peacekeeping, creating a just global
economy, and establishing democracy and good governance.
The cooperation with these anchor states focuses on three
main areas: concentration in terms of content; building
dialogue and expanding relations; and encouraging
exchanges between researchers and business leaders in the
partner countries, among the partner countries and with
Germany. BMZ works directly with nine of the 15 anchor
states: Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Pakistan,
Mexico, Nigeria and South Africa – in order to steadily
transform development cooperation into strategic
partnerships. There is currently no bilateral development
cooperation with the anchor countries Argentina, Iran,
Russia and Saudi Arabia. In May 2008, Chancellor Angela
Merkel signed a strategic partnership agreement with Brazil,
negotiated during the G8 summit in Heiligendamm in 2007.
As the financial strength of the anchor states improves,
their contributions to development interventions under
financial and technical cooperation agreements are gradually
raised. The policy for anchor countries also includes helping
them build up their own development cooperation structures.
For instance, Germany is advising Mexico on setting up its
own agency for development cooperation, and is extending
environmental projects being carried out under the Mexican–
German partnership to other Central American countries.
As well as BMZ, various other German ministries also
implement programmes in the anchor states. Although in
theory a lot could be gained from synergies between them,
institutional rivalries often hamper such benefits in practice.
The difficulty in coordinating the efforts of different
ministries is perhaps most evident in Afghanistan, where four
ministries are involved in reconstruction – BMZ, the Foreign
Office, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of the Interior.
They have all been ordered to support Afghanistan, but three
ministries demand the leadership: BMZ, because it has the
longest experience in development and reconstruction; Defence,
because more than 4000 troops are deployed there; and the
Foreign Office, because it is responsible for maintaining
diplomatic relations. In 2009, parliament granted the Ministry
of Defence €571 million, the Foreign Office €91 million, and
BMZ €90 million for their operations in Afghanistan. The
Foreign Office is now also involved in vocational training and
health, which are actually among the core tasks of the BMZ.
Development actors
Institutional rifts
The implementation of German development policy has
traditionally been split among a number of key institutions.
The division between the agencies for technical cooperation
(GTZ) and financial cooperation (KfW) is another German
peculiarity. There have been regular discussions and
consultations about uniting GTZ and KfW, but the final
decision is always postponed. In the partner countries,
however, it is increasingly common that a ‘German house’ is
established, which accommodates the offices of the different
government development organizations. But the actual level
of cooperation still depends largely on the individual staff of
the different offices.
Discussions on integrating the BMZ into the Foreign
Office also regularly surface, but things remain as they are.
Often, the simple reason for this is that coalition
governments need a number of ministries, and the BMZ and
the Foreign Office are usually headed by ministers from
different parties. When the discussions become really serious,
NGOs and churches usually start publicizing their arguments
as to why development policy needs to retain a ministry of
its own.
Political foundations
The German government supports the development programmes of
various political foundations (Stiftungen). In 2007, €189.5 million was
divided among:
• Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES) – links with the Social Democratic
Party (SPD)
• Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FNS) – links with the Free
Democratic Party (FDP)
• Hanns Seidel Foundation (HSS) – links with the Christian Socialist
Union (CSU)
• Heinrich Böll Foundation (hbs) – links with Bündnis 90/Die Grünen
(Alliance 90/Greens)
• Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS) – links with the Christian
Democratic Union (CDU)
• Rosa Luxemburg Foundation – links with Die Linke (the Left)
In addition to the wide range of state-funded organizations,
many individual federal German states (Länder) are involved
in development cooperation, as well as a large number of
NGOs, faith-based organizations, political foundations and
other private bodies. About 100 German NGOs are
organized in an umbrella organization, VENRO. The BMZ
provides financial support for, and exchanges views and
experiences with, these organizations. The NGOs are
involved in formulating the BMZ’s country, regional and
sector strategies and, through VENRO, in raising public
awareness of development issues.
The foundations associated with the different political
parties, another German peculiarity, are involved in projects
to strengthen multi-party democracy, and to support civil
society organizations and trade unions (see box). These
foundations are not necessarily linked to specific parties in
the partner countries, but they open up the circle of
traditional actors in development cooperation, and contribute
to the strengthening of democratic structures.
In addition to its bilateral assistance, Germany contributes
to the development efforts of many European and
multilateral institutions. Although for many years Germany
has played a rather restrained role in these institutions, it now
wishes to have more influence on the international stage. For
decades the German government – unlike those of France
and the UK – has underestimated the importance of placing
highly qualified personnel in key positions in international
organizations. Clearly, this situation is set to change.
□ BMZ (2008) Auf dem Weg in die Eine Welt/Towards One World,
development policy white paper.
□ BMZ (2007) Development-Oriented Transformation in Conditions of
Fragile Statehood and Poor Government Performance, BMZ
Strategies 153.
□ Holtz, U. (2006) Abschied von der Gießkanne, Stationen aus 50
Jahren deutscher Entwicklungspolitik, in: Eins- EntwicklungspolitikInformation Nord-Süd, 23-24-2006, Frankfurt/Main.
1 For a longer version visit www.thebrokeronline.eu.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
25
research horizons
Fishing for alternatives
Illegal fishing is threatening the livelihoods of many West African fishing communities. Alhaji
Jallow of the FAO Regional Office for Africa believes that the scope of research needs to be
broadened to include not just marine resources, but also the people who exploit them.
Hollandse Hoogte / Hoogervorst
When the FAO Regional Office for Africa was set up
in Ghana 50 years ago, protecting fisheries was one
of its priorities. Is that work still as important today?
Alhaji Jallow is senior fisheries officer at the UN Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO) Regional Office for Africa, based in Accra, Ghana. He
holds an MSc in fisheries economics from the University of Portsmouth,
UK. Before joining the FAO, Jallow worked for many years in the
Fisheries Department, Ministry of Natural Resources of the Government
of The Gambia, where he was responsible for setting up various
artisanal fisheries development programmes. He also worked as
coordinator of an artisanal fisheries project funded by the European
Union, and as a consultant on a national biodiversity programme
funded by the US Agency for International Development.
Interview by Ellen Lammers.
26
Across Africa around 3 million fishers and fish farmers
depend directly on fisheries and aquaculture for their
livelihoods. A further 7 million men and women depend on
the sector through their work as fish handlers, processors and
traders. Artisanal fisheries have long been a very important
economic sector in West Africa. For the residents of some
coastal communities, up to 60% of their animal protein
intake comes from fish. And where distribution systems are
efficient, inland communities can obtain smoke-dried fish
that can be stored for months. Since most of these
communities do not have facilities for chilling or freezing
food, this makes fish much more important than beef.
Exports of fish and fish products, mostly from artisanal
fisheries, are increasing, generating about US$2.7 billion each
year. Note that this does not include most of the regional trade
within Africa and the catches of foreign fleets that operate in
African waters under different agreements. The African
industrial fishing sector has always been weak, and this is
reflected in its limited contribution to GDP in most countries.
Well managed fisheries could make greater contributions
to the region’s economies. Investments in vessels and fishing
gear continue to be a challenge because of escalating prices.
Banks are reluctant to provide credit for the sector, which
they consider more risky than agriculture. Unlike farming,
where you can see the crops, the potential of the seas is not
obvious to the untrained eye.
What changes have you witnessed over the years?
Perhaps the most disconcerting developments have been the
increasing number of bilateral fishing agreements, and the
incidence of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU)
fishing, which threatens to deplete fish stocks worldwide. It
has been estimated that IUU fishing costs sub-Saharan
Africa at least US$1 billion (€0.7 billion) each year. The
problem is that governments cannot afford to police their
waters to prevent illegal vessels operating within their
exclusive economic zones (EEZs).1
A recent survey by Greenpeace, for example, revealed that
out of 92 trawlers observed off the coast of Guinea, 10% had
no name or flag, 33% had no licence and 50% were fishing
illegally. Of these violators, 66% were Chinese. These illegal
operators take advantage of the fact that African countries
are unable to patrol their fishing grounds. They do not pay
for licences, observers or other national surveillance systems,
so their operating costs are minimal.
All of this is having a heavy toll on traditional fishing
communities. In 2008, Ghanaian fishermen mounted
widespread protests against Chinese pair trawlers, which drag
large nets over the seabed, destroying the habitats of juvenile
fish. There are also frequent conflicts between industrial
trawlers and artisanal canoes, which sometimes result in fatal
collisions and irreparable damage to the locals’ fishing gear.
The over-exploitation of West African coastal waters means
that local fishermen are compelled to go out for longer periods
and to more distant grounds, which increases their operating
costs. Their catches are also often smaller, reducing their
profitability, and forcing many fishermen into debt.
How could research help this situation?
Effective management and allocation of fisheries resources
requires knowledge of the potential of marine resources and
would facilitate monitoring, which at present is hampered by
the lack of data on fish stocks. Few African countries have
specialized research institutes that can conduct surveys, so
that governments have to rely on ad hoc stock assessments.
are still using data from the 1970s.
Without reliable data on the deteriorating state of the
EEZs, it is almost impossible to convince politicians that they
need to be more cautious about issuing licences to foreign
fishing vessels. But governments are desperate for foreign
currency, which the licences bring in, and so dismiss the
warnings of regional fisheries bodies. If these bodies could
provide advice based on objective and reliable data, it would
be much harder for decision makers to ignore them.
Africa needs specialized research on fish stocks, especially
those that are shared, and on the options for sustainable
management. But this would require expensive vessels and
research equipment. Foreign donors are contributing, but it
is high time that West African governments and national
institutions invested more in fisheries research.
And what about the region’s fishing communities?
Socio-economic research that assesses the impact of IUU
fishing on the livelihoods of fishing communities is urgently
needed. I must add that it is not only the illegal fishing that
threatens the livelihoods of fisherfolk. The costs of
equipment are prohibitive. As artisanal fishers are forced to
travel to more distant fishing grounds, many are motorizing
their canoes at a time of rising fuel prices. The increasing
price of electricity has also affected the price of ice that some
operators use to store their catch while at sea.
On land, deforestation means that the wood that is used to
build traditional canoes is becoming scarce and more
expensive. Some fishermen have resorted to imported
fibreglass canoes, which last longer, but the initial investment
and maintenance costs are higher. All of these factors are
affecting the profitability of many family businesses. At a
time of rising global food prices, they also threaten the food
security of entire communities.
The potential impacts of these developments are
frightening. As fisherfolk lose their means of earning a
livelihood, this could create serious socio-economic
problems, particularly in West Africa. Countries will lose
their main source of export earnings, and of protein. The
fishermen and their families have few alternatives. They do
not have the training to become farmers, and if they do, few
have the patience to wait for months for a harvest and
income. They are used to receiving payment, however small,
every day. The daily income affects the expenditure patterns
in fishing communities, and most fishermen do not save.
They walk away from the beach and spend their money,
expecting to earn it again the next day.
Such patterns are not well documented, and there is an
urgent need for research that provides a better picture of the
livelihoods and their profitability. With adequate information,
we can propose alternatives for diversifying their sources of
income. Traditionally, fisheries research has focused on the
biology of fish. The scope of such research needs to be
broadened to include socio-economic studies that can
provide the information needed to help in managing the
people and the communities who exploit these resources.
This has become just as important as managing the fish and
fisheries resources of Africa.
□ Kraan, M. (2009) Creating Space for Fishermen’s Livelihoods, Brill/
Africa Studies Centre, Leiden.
1 A longer version can be found at www.thebrokeronline.eu.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
27
The militarization of space
Negotiating space
Recent political, military and technological developments indicate that
the international consensus on the uses of space is under threat.
Agreement on preventive arms control in space could soon be reached,
as long as all countries choose to cooperate.
O
n 11 January 2007, the Chinese used a ground-based
missile to destroy an aging weather satellite orbiting
800 km above Earth. This test of anti-satellite technology,
the first in 20 years, demonstrated China’s ability to target
regions of space that are home to communications and spy
satellites and space-based missile defence systems. The
incident drew sharp protests from nations with satellite
programmes, and raised international alarm about the
possibility of an arms race in space.
Is that alarm justified, and if so, what steps are being taken
to strengthen international space law to prevent an arms race
in space becoming a reality?
The Outer Space Treaty (1967) represents the legal
framework of international space law. The intent of the
treaty, ratified by 99 states, is to ensure that no weapons are
placed in outer space, and that the exploration and uses of
outer space benefit all nations. But on closer inspection,
existing international law does not actually prohibit all
weapons in space. The Outer Space Treaty prohibits the
placement of nuclear weapons and weapons of mass
destruction in Earth orbit, and the Moon and other celestial
bodies may be used only for peaceful purposes. But it does
not prohibit the deployment of conventional weapons in
orbit.1
So far, nations have complied with the letter, but clearly
not the spirit, of the Outer Space Treaty and other
international agreements. Recent political, military and
technological developments demonstrate that the consensus
enshrined in these agreements is under threat.
Weapons in space
Since the launch of the first satellite Sputnik in 1957, the
number of objects circling Earth has risen dramatically.
There are now hundreds of satellites used for observation
By Ineke Malsch, an independent consultant and writer on technology
and society, based in Utrecht, the Netherlands.
28
summary
•The Outer Space Treaty prohibits the placement of weapons of mass
destruction in space, but not of conventional weapons.
•In 2007, there were more than 200 dedicated military satellites
in orbit, as well as hundreds of ‘dual-use’ observation and
communication satellites.
•The debris resulting from collisions in space is a matter of growing
concern for all nations with satellite programmes.
•Since 2006, there has been renewed international debate on ways to
encourage peaceful uses of outer space, either by legal agreements or
voluntary measures.
•In May 2009 the Conference on Disarmament agreed to resume
discussions on proposals for preventing an arms race in outer space.
and communication, and for scientific research. Although no
weapons have yet been placed in orbit, they could be
deployed within a decade or so, threatening international
peace and security.
The United States, the Soviet Union/Russia and other
countries have been conducting military activities in space
for decades. In 2007, there were more than 200 operational,
dedicated military satellites orbiting Earth – 136 belonging to
the US, and 67 to Russia. There are also many more
‘dual-use’ observation and communication satellites that are
used for both civilian and military purposes. Several
European countries, Canada, China, Israel, India, Japan and
Thailand are also developing their own military capabilities
in space.
A country that wishes to attack a foreign satellite outside
Earth’s atmosphere does not need armed satellites, however.
Missiles can be fired from aircraft, warships or from the
ground, as the Chinese test in 2007 demonstrated. Russia
has suggested that it is developing an anti-satellite (ASAT)
missile capability. Such developments are simply a new
chapter in an old story. During the Cold War, the US and
the Soviet Union funded programmes to develop groundbased ASAT missile systems. At present, 28 states can
ANP / Science Photo Library
Star Wars: a purely fictional conception of warfare in space?
launch missiles up to suborbital heights, 10 nations have
missiles that can reach orbit, and as many as 30 countries
may have developed low-power lasers capable of damaging
satellites. Japan and India may also be developing groundbased ASATs.
Ballistic missiles
The US withdrawal from the Anti-ballistic Missile (ABM)
Treaty in 2002 led to a new arms race to develop
intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and a missile
defence shield using anti-ballistic missiles (ABMs). Outer
space is not immune to this arms race, because some
ground-based ABMs can target ICBMs outside the
atmosphere.
There have been frequent media reports about the
controversial US plans for a missile defence shield, which
were expected to include placing interceptor missiles and
radar installations in eastern Europe by 2013, in order to
protect the US and its allies against possible missile attacks
by Iran. Recently, President Barack Obama announced that
no long-range missiles will be placed in Poland, but that
missile defence in Europe in the coming years will focus on
short- and medium-range missiles that will not leave the
atmosphere.1 The US Congress has also looked into other
alternatives, including placing missiles in other countries or
on submarines, or retaining existing defence capabilities in
Europe.
In June 2009, US deputy defence secretary William J.
Lynn announced a ballistic missile defence review that will
focus on the threats from extremist movements, emerging
powers with sophisticated weapons, failed states, as well as
the spread of weapons of mass destruction. This will be no
small endeavour. President Obama has said he wants to
reserve US$7.8 billion (€5.5 billion) for ballistic missile
defence in 2010. Russia is also planning to improve the
capability of its (nuclear) ICBMs to overcome missile
defences by 2016.
So far, there are no satellites armed with missiles that can
attack other satellites or targets on the ground. But that is not
because no one has yet tried to develop them. In the 1980s,
the US worked on ‘Brilliant Pebbles’, a programme to devise
a system of satellite-based mini-missiles with conventional
warheads that could intercept hostile missiles. Although the programme was cancelled in 1994, it is now being
re-evaluated for possible future use.
Both the US and the Soviet Union have worked on
directed energy systems, or lasers, capable of intercepting
ICBMs during spaceflight. Even now, the US is continuing
relevant missile defence R&D, but Congress is restricting
funding. The US Missile Defense Agency is funding work by
Lockheed Martin and Raytheon on ‘multiple-kill vehicles’
that can be launched on a single rocket and fired while in
orbit to destroy ICBMs or satellites.
China, India, Israel and several EU countries are investing
in dual-use technologies that could be used to place weapons
in space. Richard Fisher, an analyst at the International
Assessment and Strategy Center in the US, believes that the
Chinese military may be developing a plane that could be
used as a space-based ground attack weapons system.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
29
Hostile policies
The weaponization of space is embedded in the defence
policies of the growing number of countries with the
capability to send missiles into space for various purposes.
Under the Bush administration, US National Space Policy
was aimed at protecting US space activities and defending
US national interests from space. The US also blocked
international arms control agreements that would restrict US
military activities in space. Although President Obama has
not yet issued a new space policy, the signs are that he
favours the integration of defence and civilian space
programmes.
In Europe, military activities in space are still mainly the
responsibility of national governments, but the European
Commission wants to improve coordination between the
defence and civilian space programmes. But there are
growing concerns, says Frank Slijper, a researcher for the
Dutch Campaign against the Arms Trade, about the gradual
militarization of European space activities without adequate
public debate.1
Russia has proposed arms control in outer space, but this
could be part of a strategy to restore Russia’s superpower
status, warns Andrei Shoumikhin of the US National
Institute for Public Policy. Russia currently does not have the
resources for an arms race in outer space against the
technologically superior US, so a comprehensive
international ban could reduce the US advantage, enabling
Russia to catch up.
Several other countries are also considering the use of
outer space in their defence strategies. Japan passed a law
permitting military uses of space in 2008, for example, and
India is considering setting up an aerospace command and
more military use of space.
Within a decade, armed satellites could be orbiting Earth,
but would this necessarily be a bad thing? As long as they
attack only other military satellites, perhaps that would be
preferable to the current asymmetric ground warfare that
results in so many civilian casualties. Even now, it is hard to
hide from prying eyes in the sky. Suppose an enemy
succeeds in dominating Earth orbit militarily and could not
only see, but also destroy targets on the ground. And even if
they could attack armed satellites, they could also threaten
the communication and observation satellites on which the
global economy and disaster monitoring now depend. Unless
all nations refrain from putting weapons in space, some
countries believe, they have no choice but to participate in
the arms race.
Preventive arms control
So how realistic is the option of ensuring peace in outer
space? Since 2006, there has been renewed international
debate on ways to encourage peaceful uses of outer space,
either by legal agreements or voluntary measures. But how
effective is international law, what are the loopholes, and
what proposals have been made to address them?
In 2006, the UN Conference on Disarmament (CD) in
Geneva resumed its discussions on preventing an arms race
30
in outer space (PAROS). Detlev Wolter, chairman of the
60th session of the UN General Assembly First Committee
on Disarmament, proposed to negotiate a new multilateral
treaty on common security in outer space and to create an
agency responsible for its implementation. In February 2008,
Russia and China retabled a draft treaty, first discussed in
2002, on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in
Outer Space (PPWT) aimed at preventing both the
militarization of space and attacks on spacecraft. In Europe,
faced with the unwillingness of the US to agree to a binding
international agreement, the EU Council proposed an
alternative draft code of conduct for outer space activities, as
a sort of compromise.
Experts disagree on whether negotiating a new legally
binding treaty or agreeing voluntary measures would be the
best approach to improving security in outer space. In
August 2008, Marius Grinius, Canadian ambassador to the
CD, thought the time was ripe to discuss the two options in
parallel. Although the US quickly rejected the draft PPWT
treaty proposed by Russia and China, on the grounds that it
would not be possible to verify reliably if all countries were
respecting the treaty, the US position may change. In
January 2009, President Obama proposed a ‘worldwide ban
on weapons that interfere with military and commercial
satellites’. In December 2008, the UN General Assembly
asked the Conference on Disarmament to discuss both
proposals for preventing an arms race in outer space. The
CD decided to do this in May 2009, after the US withdrew
its opposition.
It seems that the table is set for discussions on preventive
arms control in outer space, if only the countries involved
can find a way out of the prisoner’s dilemma, and decide that
it is far better to cooperate.
The author gratefully acknowledges the comments and suggestions
by Drs Tanja Masson-Zwaan, University of Leiden and
president of the International Institute of Space Law; Professor
Bert Chapman, Purdue University Libraries; and Fr Paul Lansu,
Pax Christi International. The contents of this article remain the
sole responsibility of the author.
□ Fisher, R.D. Jr (2008) … And races into space, Wall Street Journal,
3 January.
□ Slijper, F. (2008) From Venus to Mars: The EU’s Steps towards the
Militarization of Space, TNI Briefing Paper, Campaign against the
Arms Trade, Amsterdam.
□ Wolter, D. (2006) Common Security in Outer Space and International
Law, UN Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR).
□ SpaceSecurity.org (2008) Space Security 2008, Project Ploughshares.
□ Relevant blogs include Res Communis (University of Mississippi School of Law): http://rescommunis.wordpress.com and
UNIDIR’s e‑di@logue: www.unidir.org/html/en/e-dialog.html
1 The full text can be found at www.thebrokeronline.eu.
The Broker thesis project
Masters of innovation
perspective’, Mujawamariya focuses on
Rwanda, whose economy depends on
agriculture, especially coffee production for
export. He examines coffee farmers and
their membership of cooperatives, which
play an important role in the production
system. The findings, based on data from
cooperatives, farmers and other key
informants, will be useful for
understanding this important social
mechanism for enhancing productivity in
the coffee sector. The reviewer described
the study as ‘original and intellectually
stimulating’.
Agriculture remains one of the most
important drivers for Africa’s economies.
Research plays an essential role in the
development of innovations that can help
increase productivity in the sector. Four
students from South Africa, Ethiopia,
Rwanda and Tanzania have examined
various aspects of agricultural
development, each focusing on a different
region, from a different perspective and
using a different methodology. What
binds these researchers is that they have
all looked at innovations that could benefit
farmers, processors and policy makers
across Africa.
Sinafikey Asrat (Addis Ababa University,
Ethiopia)
In ‘Economic analysis of farmers’
preferences for crop variety traits using a
choice experiment approach: Lessons for
on-farm conservation and technology
adoption in Ethiopia’, Asrat uses a choice
experiment method to reveal the
preferences of farmers for particular crops.
The findings reveal that the farmers’
preferences are based on the crops’ ability
to withstand drought, rather than on the
level of profit they could generate. Asrat
then convincingly relates these crop
preferences to a number of household
characteristics. The reviewer commended
this thesis as ‘a good example of creative
thinking focused on the development of a
sector that is important for many
Ethiopians’.
Al Harris (University of KwaZulu-Natal,
South Africa)
In ‘Development of a spatial sugarcane
transport infrastructure planning model’,
Harris investigates the potential of
geographical information systems (GIS) to
improve infrastructure planning for the
sugar industry. In his study, Harris shows
how the sugar industry could use GIS to
reduce transportation costs significantly.
According to the reviewer, ‘The findings
are potentially very useful, and hopefully
some of them will be applied in future
policy’.
Gaudiose Mujawamariya (Wageningen
University, the Netherlands)
In ‘Cooperatives in the development of
coffee farming in Rwanda: Membership
choice from a transaction cost economics
Athumani Msalale Lupindu
(Wageningen University, the Netherlands)
In ‘Pastoralists in Mbeya district of
Tanzania and their perceptions of national
livestock policy’, Lupindu presents a
concise study of the process of change in
Tanzania, where the government is
encouraging pastoralists to make the
transition from their traditional way of life
to a modern livestock system in order to
increase productivity and reduce
environmental degradation. Lupindu’s
research gives insights into the
pastoralists’ perceptions of the policy, and
how they are adapting to the new system.
In his review, Rudy Rabbinge commented
that ‘the findings of this study on the
long- and short-term impacts of the policy
and its practical consequences will be
helpful for policy makers’.
BigStockPhoto
This is the first report on The Broker
thesis project. It highlights the
theses submitted by four students
from Africa. The theses have been
reviewed by Meine Pieter van Dijk of
the UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water
Education, Delft, the Netherlands;
George Essegbey, director of the
Science and Technology Policy
Research Institute and of the Council
for Scientific and Industrial Research,
Ghana; and Rudy Rabbinge of
Wageningen University, the
Netherlands.
The Broker thesis project is a platform
for masters-level research on developmentrelated issues. Masters graduates from
around the world are invited to submit their
theses for review by an international
reading committee consisting of policy
makers, journalists, politicians and
academics. The reviewers will assess the
theses on the basis of their originality,
scientific quality and relevance to
practitioners and policy makers in the field
of international development.
This new section of The Broker will
present reviews of the most outstanding
theses submitted, offering insights into the
wide range of research carried out by
masters students from all continents. The full texts of the reviews and the theses can be found at
www.thebrokeronline.eu/the_broker_thesis
Have you recently completed a masters
thesis on a development-related issue such
as energy, agriculture, health, conflict
resolution, governance, innovation or
sustainable development in general? If so,
and you wish to participate in The Broker
thesis project, visit the website for details,
or email [email protected] for
further information.
The Broker
issue 16
October 2009
31
column
Chinese puzzle
hat’s the connection between China’s one-child
policy and the ability of the United States to continue
spending beyond its means? You can be excused for not
immediately guessing the answer to this bizarre question.
The truth is an amazing story.
In 1979, following a devastating famine, the Chinese
Communist Party decided to regulate fertility in order to
achieve a better balance between the people’s future needs
and China’s ability to produce food. Although the one-child
policy (OCP) is less unambiguous than its crisp name
suggests (rural families were allowed to have a second child if
the first one was a girl), it restricted the freedom of most
couples to choose how many children they would have. It has
been estimated that due to the OCP there are now
300 million fewer Chinese than there otherwise would have
been. While this is almost certainly an overestimate of the
effect of the OCP – the birth rate was already falling before
the policy was implemented – few people doubt that the
Chinese attempt to regulate fertility amounts to a first-order
social intervention.
In 2007, two Chinese economists published an ingenious
article exploring the income effects of the OCP.1 The
Communist Party’s hypothesis was borne out by the data;
regions with fewer babies experience faster income growth.
This probably comes as no surprise to neo-Malthusians.
However, the mechanism linking the OCP to higher incomes
is not well understood, and few people believe that Malthus’s
dismal world view – based on a mismatch between resources
and people – provides the whole story. One rather
unexpected complementary storyline is as follows.
It is well known that the gender ratio in China is quite
distorted. In some provinces, 30% more boys than girls are
born. Boys are preferred to girls, in rural areas, because they
provide security for old age. Especially since the late 1980s,
when ultrasound technology became widely available to allow
pre-natal sex screening, the number of boys born has
systematically outnumbered that of girls. Recent research
suggests that about half the gender gap is explained by the
OCP. If couples really want to have a son, and are restricted
in the number of children they can raise, the evidence
suggests they may resort to drastic measures to make sure
their offspring includes a boy. This certainly was an
unexpected and undesirable side effect of the OCP.
By Erwin Bulte, professor of economics at Wageningen University and
Tilburg University. He is also a research fellow at the University of
Cambridge and an adviser to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.
BigStockPhoto
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Which brings us to the final piece of the puzzle. If the
number of boys in the maternity ward consistently exceeds
that of girls, then eventually men will be more plentiful than
women. And as women are becoming scarce in China, they
become more ‘valuable’. Specifically, women can afford to
become more demanding in the marriage market, and the
competition among men to attract a spouse intensifies. How
do parents help their son to find a wife? They save money to
provide him with a superior starting position – they support
him with money for a nice house and fancy items that
prospective wives might like. In the countryside, the parents
of teenage boys are engaged in a race to accumulate savings.
And the more skewed the local gender ratio, the harder they
compete. The Chinese save an astronomical 50% of their
incomes, and China has become the world’s leading creditor.
According to a recent study, about half of these savings can
be explained by marriage competition induced by the OCP
– another unexpected side effect of the policy.
So here we have the full story. The one-child policy raised
incomes but made girls and women scarce. This invited a
massive savings response by desperate parents who want the
best for their sons. Quite a bit of these savings eventually
found its way abroad. It is well known that Chinese savings
have allowed the current generation of Americans to spend
more money than they earn. But it is interesting, and
surprising, that this behaviour was facilitated by Chinese
communists fretting about Malthusian nightmare scenarios
in the 1970s.
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The power of value chains

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