Crop Agnostic or Crop specific? A follow-on discussion from the Market System Symposium
Written by Sandrine Chetail-Armour, Sr Director Economic Opportunities
At the Market Systems Symposium in November 2023, over 200 practitioners gathered in Cape Town, South Africa, and debated new ideas and approaches related to MSD.
One of the topics that unleashed enthusiastic discussions was centered on the question of whether MSD interventions should be crop-agnostic or crop-specific. Crop agnostic means that we do not target specific crops, or sectors, during our market systems interventions and instead focus on market functions that cut across sectors, like agriculture inputs or finance. By contrast, crop specific means we support specific value chains or sectors. Interestingly, this does not just apply to agriculture, but can also be discussed for all types of market systems.[1]
Since then, I have had the opportunity to reflect on this question for several Mercy Corps programs — the most recent program focusing on small business development. The question as to whether we should narrow down our support to focus on a few specific markets or instead tackle a few “functions” of market systems that are relevant to many sectors has been central to the design of those programs.
At the Symposium, I heard two schools of thought -
- Market interventions that are crop agnostic (or sector-agnostic) can help reach scale and resilience. Indeed, improving a specific function in the market can help solve the function issue for all crops, or sectors. If we take the example of seeds, and if one of the functions we want to improve is seed certification, then addressing the certification issue will lead to change at scale for all seeds, regardless of which crop we are talking about. Our interventions will also be more likely to encourage the diversification of use of seeds given that we are improving the seed market that serves many crops, thus creating a greater diversity of quality options for farmers that supports increased resilience.
- The other school of thought is that we do need to be crop specific (or sector specific) to ensure impact. The idea here is that if we focus our efforts on one or two markets, or sectors, we have a greater likelihood of increasing the depth of our impact. If we select a specific crop such as maize, and improve the whole maize market, from production to sale, including relevant policies and gender norms, we are more likely to have an impact on overall productivity, thus impacting the size and functionality of many functions in the market, and with this, support the production of surplus, develop brand recognition, foster trade and exports, and ultimately have a more sustained economic impact.
As I further reflect on this, I would say “it depends”.
First and foremost, our programs are designed to improve people’s lives, so it is important to start agnostic, and let our assessments tell us which leverage point in which market system(s) we should address to have maximum impact.
If this leverage point is a cross-cutting function, like financial services or transport, which has the potential to improve economic opportunities across numerous relevant sectors, then we might be able to take a sector- or crop-agnostic strategy.
…but be careful. There are numerous contextual factors that might drive us towards a specific crop or sector. Consider whether the shared constraint can really be addressed by a shared solution. And consider whether our shared solution really pays attention to whether there is indeed an opportunity in the sectors the cross-cutting function serves. Improving financial services for producers in certain crops will only have an impact if there is actual demand for those crops.
One could argue that even in apparently cross-cutting functions, sector-specific solutions are needed. For example, in the financial sector, there are adapted financial products for specific crops depending on the potential return on investment, duration of production, and perishability. Similarly under the transport function, certain crops that are more perishable will require cold chain or specific packaging to avoid losses along the way.
We also need to remember that the market actors we will need to work with are often very different between sectors — when this is the case, our work has to be narrowed down to a few sectors to ensure we work with the right actors. For example, for export sectors, regional actors and exporters will be critical actors to work with, whereas for sectors focused on local markets, the focus can be on local market actors only.
If our leverage point is related to gender norms and regulations (so the rules and norms of our market system), then we will often need to be more sector specific — women’s control over and engagement in the market depends on the crop or market we are targeting. In many parts of Africa, for example, women are more likely to keep and expand their control over certain crops such as beans, cassava or shoats, whereas markets such as maize, coffee or cattle are more likely to be controlled by men. Similarly, some crops are very political and government market oversight will differ between crops. In Syria for example, the wheat market is heavily controlled by the government, and any interventions in this market will require high levels of government engagement and advocacy for policy changes.
It is an interesting discussion that can go either way…In all cases, we do need to start by being sector or market-agnostic. Whether or not we then re-focus on a few sectors will depend on the response to those questions — Is the product or service really applicable to multiple sectors or do different crops/sectors require different types of functions such as financial services or transport? Are there relevant market actors that are truly sector agnostic and can/will/do serve multiple sectors? Are there political, gender-based, or other differences between sectors that might mean we are more effective at achieving our objectives if we are sector specific? Ultimately, the decision on being sector agnostic or sector-specific will need to be based on strong market assessments and an understanding of the potential scale of impact. It will also need to be based on the ancillary outcomes we want to achieve — if we are looking to increase the inclusion of specific groups, or improve climate resilience and biodiversity, re-focusing on the specific sectors that can help us achieve these outcomes will be key.
[1] See our MSD4E guidance on sector selection
