From 24 to 31 January, Olga van der Valk and Monika Sopov (Wageningen International) visited Ethiopia (Ziway and Meki in the Rift Valley south of Addis Ababa) to develop a Market Information System (MIS) for small-scale outgrowers of green beans, whose production is contracted by an exporter to Europe. The design of an MIS was requested by a project with CFC funding aiming at promoting small-scale growers' participation in exports. In a workshop with local stakeholders, findings were discussed of an earlier assessment on market information sources and communication lines, employed by small growers in the region.
Regarding the design of an MIS, the concept of market insecurity was introduced. An MIS is an instrument to reduce market insecurity by providing more transparency in the market. Other instruments are the implementation of (innovative) technology and horizontal and vertical market coordination to strengthen market position and to combat seasonality. For further definition of the MIS, stakeholders were asked to prioritise their demand for information: whether related to export or domestic markets; whether on daily fluctuating information (prices, supply) or market technical data for the development of marketing strategies.
From the discussions, it became clear that neither stakeholders nor the farmers currently work with (a vision on) long-term marketing strategies to develop the small-scale horticulture sector; making it difficult to prioritise the marketing information needed and to design and operate an MIS. The proposal by the workshop stakeholders was to enter into dialogue with the Ethiopian government to improve its centralised MIS used for statistical purposes, to make it more accessible to farmers. The recommendation by the Dutch experts was to set up a business service centre to collect available historical data/surveys/statistical information and use this information to provide support in the development of marketing planning skills among small-scale farmers and governmental officers. This will enable farmers to efficiently use and sustain the technology currently in development (packing houses).