A Shared Approach for Smallholder Performance Measurement

“I think there is real value in a group of companies engaged in measuring the status of their smallholder supply chains to come together and learn from one another about what is working and what’s not. By sharing our learning, and by collaborating to develop a shared approach to performance measurement we can avoid duplication of efforts and gather more actionable data more efficiently.”

-Duncan Pollard, Nestlé

Who are the farmers who grow our coffee, our tea, and our vanilla? What are the risks to their farming systems or the wellbeing of their families?

How do the companies that buy their products secure their supply and reputations ?

Are things really getting better when farmers get certified? Or when they start trading with global companies? Or when their access to credit, training, and agricultural inputs is improved?

These questions reflect a growing desire from many companies, donors, lenders, NGOs, certification organizations, and farmer groups, to know more about who the farmers are and how farming systems are changing over time. We need to measure supply chains conditions more effectively in order to make sure that trade is having a positive impact towards more sustainable farming practices.

Answering these questions is challenging. Supply chains are characterized by diverse and often remote small-scale producers, and information systems and literacy cannot be assumed. It can be difficult to know what to ask, and how to ask it in ways that are credible, reliable, and affordable.

Yet, without good measurement systems, we cannot have the necessary feedback loops between growers and buyers, between farmers and NGOs that help us understand the problems, set priorities, and know whether things are improving.

 

Community of Practice
To help address this challenge, a collaboration of companies, NGOs, lenders, voluntary standards, and donors are developing and testing a shared approach to performance measurement, building on the multi-stakeholder work by leaders in the field, like COSA and ISEAL.

The goal is to identify a credible and appropriate set of learning questions and indicators that can form a common framework for assessing and tracking improvements in the sustainability of smallholder agricultural supply chains.

Having a consistent and common framework to guide the choice of indicators and metrics can:

• Increase pre-competitive learning across studies
• Reduce costs, waste, and confusion for suppliers and farmers,
• Improve study design by building on good practices and tested metrics.

This approach focuses on cost effectively tracking change over time rather than detailed studies to quantify the impact of specific interventions.

 

What does it mean to take a “shared approach”?
In practice, this means:

• Drawing on the framework as a resource when choosing indicators
• Using the same metrics when asking the same questions whenever possible,
• Sharing experiences about what works and what doesn’t to ensure continued improvement of the framework.

 

RESOURCES:

• Overview of the Shared Approach Framework For Performance Measurement: Food Lab Performance Measurement Community of Practice
• Full paper: Towards a Shared Approach to Smallholder Performance Measurement
• A Practitioners Guide to Developing a Performance Measurement Approach
  
• Fieldwork: Assessing the Sustainability of Smallholder Sugar in Paraguay by the Sustainable Food Lab 

Shared Approach Framework For Performance Measurement

Impact Areas	Guiding Question	Indicator	Rationale
Livelihood and Well Being	Are farmers meeting basic needs and seeing improvement?	Food Security: Access to sufficient food	Food security is a key component of sustainable livelihoods, understood by many as a basic right, and is a CSR and sustainability risk. It is important to measure separately where possible because of cases where gains in income didn’t lead to gains in food security.
		Income	Household revenue can show whether the household is above a poverty line and whether overall revenue is improving with crop income. But household income can be difficult to estimate in a quick survey. One approach is the Progress out of Poverty Index (PPI). The PPI is a 10 question, country-specific survey developed by the Grameen Foundation. It measures the likely percent of producers above an absolute poverty line, or above local poverty line.
		Assets	Measurement of a few key assets like land-holding, access to electricity, ownership of a form of transportation, or communication device, and type of cooking fuel used allows us to learn more about the farmer’s living conditions and is complementary to efforts to measure income.
		Perceived Well-Being	Farmer perception of well-being can be equally as important as other livelihood indicators as it gives a sense of whether farmers believe their basic needs are being met and whether they will continue with this crop.
Gender	What are women’s roles and benefits in this crop?	Women’s participation in crop	If women are doing the work of the crop, but not going to trainings, trading, or involved in decision-making, there may be opportunities for improving inclusivity of women and therefore household well-being.
		Equitable Access to Training
		Participation in Decision-Making
Environmental Performance	Is the land well stewarded?	Adoption of conservation practices	Identify 3-5 key conservation practices appropriate to the system being examined, such as cover cropping, no till, drip irrigation, etc.  Where practical also look for outcome based indicators that fit within the scope of performance measurement.
Farm Productivity	Are farmers realizing the potential of their farm?	Adoption of best practices	Training only has benefits if the new practices are adopted. Typical approaches look at 3-5 key practices that drive productivity or quality. Specific practices must be identified for each crop. Adoption signifies an investment on the part of the farmer and that they are following practices most likely to result in good productivity.
		Estimated Productivity	It is important to measure productivity to track improvements in farming outcomes independent of price volatility. Look at farmer recollection of productivity through survey questions about 1) yield and 2) land area planted.
		Crop Revenue	Crop revenue (production times price) tracks the revenue contribution of the crop. Net crop income is better when possible because profits are dependent on production costs.  Typical key costs to measure are hired labor and inputs costs.
Access to Services	Do farmers have access to services?	Access to credit, training and inputs	Access to services like training, credit and inputs is critical for farmer success.
	Are farmers using these services?	Use of credit, training, and inputs	Use of services measures the functional attractiveness of the services.  Only if farmer use the services can they improve farm outcomes.
Trading Relationships	Are farmers experiencing good trading relationships?	Satisfaction with Primary Buyer	Trading relationships well designed for smallholders can promote things like greater transparency, collaboration, stability, and risk sharing. Consensus on generalized common indicators is not currently available, so identify 3-5 key indicators specific to the situation.