Projekt

In recent years the development of market- and export-oriented agriculture has been portrayed to be an important means of economic development and poverty alleviation for poor countries of the global South. This idea has been a result of advances in agriculture, increasing integration of developing countries into international value chains, and growing global food markets. In Ghana, increasing pressures on land and price volatility of global food markets have made investments in commercial export agriculture risky. Supply chain standards set by transnational food companies that dominate the agricultural export market shifts market power and decision making to the detriment of smallholders. Nevertheless, the cocoa growing areas in the South with a history of commercial and export-oriented agriculture is increasingly promoted and supported by government and donors. However, the development of export-oriented agriculture has largely bypassed the three regions in Northern Ghana. In the last decade, the regions are gradually emerging on the global value chains, exporting shea nuts, mango, and cashew. Given that smallholders risk losing the limited economic autonomy that diversified livelihood strategies offer if they enter into contractual arrangements and certification; coupled with less scientific evidence on the way peasant autonomy, local institutions and the local political economy is affected regarding integrating northern Ghana's agricultural products into global markets. The objective of the study is to map out the value chains of shea nuts, mango, and cashew from Ghana to European consumers in order to undertake an in-depth analysis to spell out how local outcomes of agricultural innovations are determined or dependent on the power structures inherent in global economic transactions; to understand the opportunities, challenges, and significance of the engagement of northern Ghanaian farmers into global agricultural markets; to explain the consequences and how peasants autonomy effect social organisation and institutions of local societies.

• Prof. Dr. Mamadou Diawara

  Universität Frankfurt am Main
  FB 08: Philosophie und Geschichtswissenschaften
  Institut für Ethnologie
  Frankfurt am Main
  

• Dr. Stefan Schmid

  Universität Frankfurt am Main
  Zentrum für interdisziplinäre
  Afrikaforschung (ZIAF)
  Campus Westend
  Frankfurt am Main
  

• Dr. Martha Adimabuno Awo

  University of Ghana
  Institute of Statistical Social
  and Economic Research (ISSER)
  Legon, Accra
  Ghana