Global consumers increasingly ask questions about the origins of goods they purchase and how those goods are produced. Are the practices sustainable? Organic? Regenerative? What assurances exist to verify that the product in hand is what it says on the label? Are producers treating their workers fairly and equitably?
Cultivating a smallholder farm may just be the most common job in the world. Smallholder farmers and their households make up between a quarter and a third of the world’s population. Their farms of about five or fewer acres create both subsistence and livelihood, and yet these farmers—and the value they bring to global society—are often overlooked by the developed world.
In parallel, global enterprise is just beginning to understand the economic risks of unsustainable and extractive practices, of exploiting or neglecting communities in favor of cutting costs, and of centralizing suppliers and supply chains while failing to build resiliencies and redundancies.
The enormous value created by the world’s billions of smallholder farmers comes into clearer view given this context. The cultivation of locally sustainable crops in a regenerative manner, where both the planet and the community can be supported, contributes to a premium consumer product continents away.
Decentralized networks of small agricultural producers across numerous geographies lessens the risk of market shocks or supply chain insufficiencies to food and clothing manufacturers, particularly when drought, fire, or pandemic disease is a more frequent risk. For governments and society as a whole, smallholder farmers as a collective are likely the most impactful actors in terms of a country’s food security. Still, most smallholder farmers survive on mere dollars a day, even when they cultivate high-value crops. Previous markets, policies, and technologies have failed to ensure that smallholder farmers are compensated commensurate with the value they provide.
In this issue of The Lydion Magazine, we explore the intersection of smallholder farming, data economics, and the “regenerative revolution.”
—The Editors
Jennifer Hinkel, Editor-in-Chief, The Lydion Magazine
Hugh Locke, Guest Editor, Co-founder and President, Smallholder Farmers Association and CEO, Smallholder Data Services
Mac McCabe, Guest Editor, Sustainable Business Expert
Tim Tensen, Guest Editor, Partner and Director of Innovation and Partnerships, Terra Genesis International
