Understand the complete cocoa value chain and farmer behaviors when designing the intervention: Designing interventions that aim to increase farmer productivity and product quality through the provision of training and other inputs with the assumption that increased income will follow without fully understanding farmer behavior, the market, and the food system may not yield desired results. If farmers do not have the capacity or incentives to adequately respond to the intervention, and if there is not a well-defined market for the improved product, the demand may not support higher prices and incomes expected from on-farm interventions. Going forward, MCC will design agricultural and related interventions with the target market or value chain in mind. By using this approach, MCC will better understand the value chain’s structure, incentives, deficiencies, and opportunities. MCC will examine the upstream and downstream ends of the value chain to better understand whether the market will sustain the proposed improvement and enable long-term sustainability.
Lesson Learned