Impact Of Agricultural Market Reforms On Smallholder Farmers In ...

households have less assets and less family labor to rely on to generate income, they are usually less welloff
than male-headed households.
Extension services are widely available in rural areas. The majority of farmers still rely on
extension agents to obtain information about agricultural production and marketing. Contacts between
extension agents and farmers are frequent and farmers seem to benefit from them. It is a good sign that
public extension services have not been curtailed with the economic liberalization efforts.
Markets have become more competitive and marketed surplus has increased. Both the
smallholder farmer and the community survey results indicate that the number of private input and output
traders has increased since 1995. Furthermore, the frequency of market operating days has also increased.
A higher number of traders and more frequent trading days should result in more competitive markets and
better choices for farmers and consumers. As a result of both higher production and more farmers selling
their produce, the volume of marketed surplus has also increased since the reforms.
ADMARC remains a significant player in input and output markets. The survey data
suggests that ADMARC is the most important supplier of inputs to farmers, and comes second after
private traders as a wholesale buyer of smallholder crops. The sheer size of ADMARC’s infrastructure
and financial resources means that it will continue to be a major force in agricultural marketing in
Malawi. Whether the presence of ADMARC is beneficial to the country as a whole or whether it
dampens the response and investment behavior of a more efficient private sector has not been addressed
by this study, but is an important issue to be investigated further.
Rural transportation and communication infrastructure is poor. Most farmers have
complained that road infrastructure has deteriorated in recent years. Transportation costs are very high in
Malawi and services are lacking. Furthermore, public telephone networks are still absent in many rural
areas. Unfortunately, the market liberalization efforts have also been accompanied by budgetary cuts and
a reduction in public investment in infrastructure. Rural road, transportation, and communication
infrastructure is crucial to facilitate the access of small farmers to markets, especially those that reside in
remote and less accessible areas.
More market-oriented and less poor farmers have benefited most from the reforms. Not
surprisingly, market reforms have provided more opportunities for farmers that could take advantage of
and participate in more competitive markets, i.e. those that are more market-oriented. Furthermore,
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