The midstream of agricultural value chains are rapidly changing in response to shifting domestic and international demand. While the performance of this segment may have important implications for the entire sector, evidence on midstream actors and their financial needs remain thin. We use data from both the Living Standards Measurement Study – Integrated Surveys on Agriculture and the World Bank Enterprise Survey from seven African countries to identify these agricultural midstream firms and assess their access to formal credit, comparing them to other, non-agricultural midstream firms. We find that the identified agricultural midstream firms are larger and more productive than their non-agricultural midstream counterparts and are less likely to report barriers to accessing credit, though overall access levels remain low. Among agricultural midstream firms, those owned or managed by women are more likely to report barriers to accessing credit. Taken together, these findings help build our understanding about the financial needs of micro-, small-, and medium-size enterprises in the agricultural midstream.

Agricultural commodity value chains (AVCs) are critical for providing income to farmers, creating em ployment opportunities, generating export revenue, and providing affordable and healthy food for con sumers. Agriculture employs 42% of people in South Asia and 53% in sub-Saharan Africa (World Bank, 2022), while agricultural growth has been shown to be three times more effective at poverty reduction than growth in other sectors (de Janvry and Sadoulet, 2009). Though the majority of existing literature has focused on producers and consumers, recent research suggests that value added in the “mid stream” of value chains, the actors between farmgate and final vendors, may be as large as 40% of the total gross value in the agricultural sector (Reardon, 2015; AGRA, 2019). This midstream is comprised predominantly of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) including traders, transporters, and processors whose potential for growth may be considerably untapped.In general, the high seasonality, geographic dispersion, and unpredictable output of the agricultural sector can make it especially difficult for the financial needs of the midstream to be met, challenges well documented and studied among small-scale producers. While there has been recent, increasing atten tion on the midstream actors in AVCs, focus on their financial needs is rare. If, in fact, they lack much access to financial products, an increase in access could lead to increased employment opportunities in the midstream, as well as more robust growth. Additionally, recent years have seen the emergence of a number of digital financial services (DFS), including mobile money and digital payment systems, digital credit, and digital marketplaces, all of which hold potential for alleviating meaningful constraints among midstream actors in AVCs. The aim of this project was to take stock of what is known about these midstream AVC actors, their fi nancial needs, and the potential of DFS to help meet those needs. In this synthesis, we summarize les sons from the project’s first phase, which included a literature review, analysis of existing microdata, documentation of previous data targeted at the midstream, and interviews with other experts in the field. We intend to use the lessons from this initial phase to prepare for specialized data collection tai lored to and targeting ident

Can perceptions data help us understand investment climate constraints facing the private sector? Or do firms simply complain about everything? In this paper, the authors provide a picture of how firms' views on constraints differ across countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Using the World Bank's Enterprise Surveys database, they find that reported constraints reflect country characteristics and vary systematically by level of income - the most elemental constraints to doing business (power, access to finance, ability to plan ahead) appear to be most binding at low levels of income. As countries develop and these elemental constraints are relaxed, governance-related constraints become more problematic. As countries move further up the income scale and the state becomes more capable, labor regulation is perceived to be more of a problem - business is just one among several important constituencies. The authors also consider whether firm-level characteristics - such as size, ownership, exporter status, and firms' own experience - affect firms' views on the severity of constraints. They find that, net of country and sector fixed effects and firm characteristics, firms' views do reflect their experience as evidenced by responses to other questions in surveys. The results suggest that there are both country-level and firm-level variations in the investment climate. Turning to the concept of binding constraints, the Enterprise Surveys do not generally suggest one single binding constraint facing firms in difficult business climates. However, there do appear to be groups of constraints that matter more at different income levels, with a few elemental constraints being especially important at low levels and a few regulatory constraints at high levels, but a difficult range of governance-related constraints at intermediate levels. Adjusting to a constraint does not mean that firms then do not recognize it - for example, generator-owning firms are not distinguishable from other firms when ranking electricity as a constraint. Overall, firms do appear to discriminate between constraints in a reasonable way. Their views can provide a useful first step in the business-government consultative process and help in prioritizing more specific behavioral analysis and policy reforms.

While agricultural value chains are rapidly evolving (Reardon, 2015; Reardon et al., 2021; Barrett et al., 2022), research attention has increasingly taken notice of the important role played by actors in the ag ricultural midstream. The agricultural midstream consists of activities that take place after production but before final sale to consumers, with existing literature highlighting transportation, trading/wholesaling, processing/packaging, and storage as key activities (Reardon, 2015; Ambler et al., 2022a). However, even as research on the agricultural midstream has been growing, little is known about the poten tial financial needs or capabilities of midstream actors (Ambler et al., 2022a; Bellemare et al., 2021; Reardon and Minten, 2021). If midstream actors face meaningful financial constraints in growing their businesses, it can hinder employment opportunities, increase consumer food prices, depress agricul tural producer prices, or constrain growth more broadly.

In the early 1990s the World Bank launched the Regional Program on Enterprise Development in several African countries, a key component of which was the collection of manufacturing firm-level data. In this paper the authors review the research based on the data sets generated by these and subsequent firm surveys in Africa, with a special view to what they think are the most important policy implications. The authors survey the research on the African business environment, focusing on market size, risk, access to credit, labor, and infrastructure. They cover the research on how firms choose to organize themselves and how firms do business. They review the research on firm performance, including firm growth, investment and technology acquisition, and exports. They conclude with an extended discussion of the policy lessons.

World Development Report 1994 examines the link between infrastructure and development and explores ways in which developing countries can improve both the provision and the quality of infrastructure services. In recent decades, developing countries have made substantial investments in infrastructure, achieving dramatic gains for households and producers by expanding their access to services such as safe water, sanitation, electric power, telecommunications, and transport. Even more infrastructure investment and expansion are needed in order to extend the reach of services - especially to people living in rural areas and to the poor. But as this report shows, the quantity of investment cannot be the exclusive focus of policy. Improving the quality of infrastructure service also is vital. Both quantity and quality improvements are essential to modernize and diversify production, help countries compete internationally, and accommodate rapid urbanization. The report identifies the basic cause of poor past performance as inadequate institutional incentives for improving the provision of infrastructure. To promote more efficient and responsive service delivery, incentives need to be changed through commercial management, competition, and user involvement. Several trends are helping to improve the performance of infrastructure. First, innovation in technology and in the regulatory management of markets makes more diversity possible in the supply of services. Second, an evaluation of the role of government is leading to a shift from direct government provision of services to increasing private sector provision and recent experience in many countries with public-private partnerships is highlighting new ways to increase efficiency and expand services. Third, increased concern about social and environmental sustainability has heightened public interest in infrastructure design and performance.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Sub-Saharan Africa's rural population is growing rapidly, and more young people are entering the labour market every year. This raises serious policy questions. Can rural economies absorb enough job seekers? Could better-educated youth transform Africa's rural economies by adopting new technologies and starting businesses? Are policymakers responding to the youth employment challenge? Or will there be widespread unemployment, social instability, and an exodus to cities and abroad? Youth and Jobs in Rural Africa: Beyond Stylized Facts uses survey data to build a nuanced understanding of the constraints and opportunities facing rural youth in Africa. Addressing the questions of Africa's rural youth is currently hampered by major gaps in our knowledge and stylized facts from cross-country trends or studies that do not focus on the core issues. Youth and Jobs in Rural Africa takes a different approach, drawing on household and firm surveys from selected African countries with an explicit focus on rural youth. It argues that a balance between alarm and optimism is warranted, and that Africa's "youth bulge" is not an unprecedented challenge. Jobs in rural areas are limited, but agriculture is transforming and youth are participating, adopting new technologies and running businesses. Governments have adopted youth employment as a priority, but policies often do not address the specific needs of rural populations. Youth and Jobs in Rural Africa emphasizes that by going beyond stylized facts and drawing on more granular analysis, we can design effective policies to turn Africa's youth problem into an opportunity for rural transformation.

One of the major knowledge challenges in the domain of Resilient and Sustainable Food Systems refers to the integration of perspectives on consumption, patterns that support public health, inclusive value chains, and environmentally sustainable food production. While there is a long record of the analysis of separate interventions, this special issue generates integrated insights, provides cross-cutting perspectives, and outlines practical and policy solutions that address these global challenges.The collection of papers promotes the view that sustainable food systems require thorough insights into the structure and dynamics of agri-food production systems, the drivers for integrating food value chains and markets, and key incentives for supporting healthier consumer choices. On the production side, potential linkages between agricultural commercialization and intensification and their effects for food security and nutritional outcomes are analyzed. Value Chains are assessed for their contribution to improving exchange networks and markets for food products that simultaneously support efficiency, circularity, and responsiveness. Individual motives and market structures for food consumption need to be understood in order to be able to outline suitable incentives to enhance healthy dietary choice.The contributed papers focus on interfaces between food system activities and processes of adaptive change that are critical for overcoming key constraints and trade-offs between sustainable food and healthy diets.

This book brings together recent findings from quantitative and qualitative research from across Africa to illuminate how young men and women engage with the rural economy, imagine their futures and how development policies and interventions find traction (or not) with these realities. Through framing, overview and evidence-based chapters, it provides a critical perspective on current discourse, research and development interventions around youth and rural development. It is organised around commonly-made foundational claims: that large numbers of young people are leaving rural areas; have no interest in agriculture; cannot access land; are stuck in permanent waithood; that the rural economy provides (or can provide) a wealth of opportunity; and that they can be the engine of rural transformation. It draws from existing literature and new analysis arising from several multi-country and multi-disciplinary studies, focusing on gender and other aspects of social difference. It is a major contribution to current debates and development policy about youth, agriculture and employment in rural Africa.