EURICSE and COSA launch a joint initiative to measure the key characteristics of effective Producer Organizations.

October 10, 2014

 

The PO initiative has assembled a select group of international experts into an Advisory Panel on the Sustainability Assessment of Producer Organizations. The Panel contains a cross section of stakeholders that represents traders, lenders, development agencies, researchers, businesses, and producer organizations.

 

“An important challenge threatening the livelihoods of smallholder farmers is the knowledge gap between trading relationships and farming practices. Producer organizations play a key role in filling this and other gaps that are vital for researchers to understand.”

 

The Advisory Panel will guide the formation of innovative measurement to ols designed to assess factors affecting the sustainability of Producer Organizations. These tools will be available in simple and more sophisticated formats and can be used in combination with COSA’s farmer survey to provide a more complete understanding of the social, economic and environmental factors affecting producers.