Smallholder cashcrop production and its impact on living standards of rural families in Kenya

Despite many poverty eradication strategies, poor quality of life is still being experienced by tea and coffee producers in Kenya. Regional development, improvement and/or sustainability of farmers’ living standards highly depend on income from these crops. Due to the depressed prices of coffee and tea, farmers have reduced their production over years leading to declining levels of living standards among the farmers. To understand these issues, this book first focussed on analysis of family resources capacity and use and thereafter investigated living standards measurements of the farm families and finally dealt with future impact analysis of various strategies on family income. The farming systems approach was applied to analyse the family resources capacity and use. Some of the living standards measurements assessed included economic success, economic security, food supply and security and household expenditures of farm families. Data analysis was done by applying different statistical and econometric methods. Results indicated a positive contribution of tea and coffee production to relative food security in both zones. Impact analysis of future development strategies was done through simulation with dynamic models at family level based on linear programming. Strategies tested in this study included changes in tea prices, improvement of capital availability among coffee farmers, changes in land utilisation and management and control in utilisation of tea payments.