The theme of Organised Farmers for Business is at the core of Agri-ProFocus’ efforts.
It is piloted by the Wageningen UR Centre for Development Innovation (WUR-CDI), in collaboration with the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT). Agri-Hub Coordinators prioritised two specific topics: farm-firm relations and economic services to farmer members.

‘Farm-firm relations’ is about relations of (organised) farmers with agrifood and agri-input companies. Using concrete cases suggested by Agri-Hub members, WUR-CDI and its partners will further develop a WUR-CDI-conceived participatory assessment tool for analysing business relations between farmers and companies. Specific attention will be given to contract farming relations and farmer-firm collaboration for developing competitive and inclusive value chains. Assessment results will be used for discussing modalities of business relations between farmers and firms and provide input for coaching trajectories.

The topic ‘economic services’ concentrates on collective action of organised farmers to support their members, e.g. small farmer entrepreneurs. The objective is to present a user-friendly ‘basket of options’. For four service areas, practical possibilities and best practices will be presented in a user-friendly manner:

• Access to production factors;
• Professionalizing production;
• Post-harvest value adding and product development
• Marketing and sales.

Information sources for developing the ‘basket of options’ are desk studies, student work and experiences in the networks of Agri-Hubs.

The outputs of this theme of the Agri-ProFocus knowledge and innovation agenda are expected by the end of 2012. They include an improved tool for participatory assessment of farmer-firm relations, results of participatory assessment of farmer-firm relations in at least five countries, case studies of organised farmers in agribusiness, recommendations for farmers’ organisations engaging in contract farming (‘checklist for farmers’) and two-pagers presenting options of economic service delivery of farmers’ organisations to their members.