Beyond the field: Impact of Farmer Field Schools on food security and poverty

TY - JOUR

T1 - Beyond the field

T2 - Impact of Farmer Field Schools on food security and poverty

AU - Larsen, Anna Folke

AU - Lilleør, Helene Bie

PY - 2014/12

Y1 - 2014/12

N2 - We estimate the impact of a Farmer Field School intervention among small-scale farmers in northern Tanzania on two main development objectives: food security and poverty. We employ a series of evaluation methodologies, including a Quasi-Difference-in-Difference setup, to account for potential selection into the project, despite lack of baseline data. We find strong positive effects on food security, but no effect on poverty. Investigating possible mechanisms for this result shows that reallocation of labor resources toward own agricultural production and improved production smoothing may have led to improved food security while poverty remained unaffected.

AB - We estimate the impact of a Farmer Field School intervention among small-scale farmers in northern Tanzania on two main development objectives: food security and poverty. We employ a series of evaluation methodologies, including a Quasi-Difference-in-Difference setup, to account for potential selection into the project, despite lack of baseline data. We find strong positive effects on food security, but no effect on poverty. Investigating possible mechanisms for this result shows that reallocation of labor resources toward own agricultural production and improved production smoothing may have led to improved food security while poverty remained unaffected.

KW - Faculty of Social Sciences

KW - Impact assessment

KW - Farmer Field Schools

KW - Food security

KW - Poverty

KW - Tanzania

KW - Africa

U2 - 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.07.003

DO - 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.07.003

M3 - Journal article

SN - 0305-750X

VL - 64

SP - 843

EP - 859

JO - World Development

JF - World Development

ER -