Post on 10-Feb-2017
The tale of a tail:About markets, on-farm diversity and diets in rural householdsMauricio R. Bellon and Gervais Ntandou-Bouzitou
Three Dimensions of Agricultural Biodiversity
Dietary diversity
On-farm diversity Market diversity
Self-consumption
Sale
Purchase
Income
Food security & dietary quality
Ecosystem & EvolutionaryServices
determinants
determinantsdeterminants
Information flow
Plant species diversity by number of households (grown and collected)
in southern Benin
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
Source: Bellon and Ntandou-Bouzitou , unpublished data.
Total number of species= 43Grown/collected > 50% of hh= 2Grown/collected > 10% of hh= 18Grown/collected< 10% of hh= 25
The tail
Plant species diversity by number of households (grown and collected) in
southern Benin
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350Conventional Focus
Source: Bellon and Ntandou-Bouzitou , unpublished data.
Ignored
Plant species diversity by number of households (grown and collected)
in southern Benin
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
Source: Bellon and Ntandou-Bouzitou , unpublished data.
Opportunities to improve diets, income, resilience
Plant species diversity by number of households (grown and collected)
in southern Benin
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
Source: Bellon and Ntandou-Bouzitou , unpublished data.
Interventions that move key species with potential to the left
Conclusions
• The “tail” presents opportunities to improve the diets, incomes and resilience of mothers, children and their households
• Need to build on local diversification strategies• Local markets are essential• Need to improve functioning of markets• Take into account the diversity of species traded
in markets and build on it as source of food and income