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Resilience for Smallholder Farmers during Pandemic:
Model Conceptualization for Agriculture
and Food Supply Chain Dynamics
Büşra Atamer Balkan
Middle East Technical University,
Ankara, Turkey.
busra.atamer@metu.edu.tr
Hector Menendez III
South Dakota State University,
South Dakota, USA.
hector.menendez@sdstate.edu
Andreas Nicolaidis Lindqvist
RISE Research Institutes of Sweden,
Lund, Sweden.
andreas.nicolaidis@ri.se
Kelechi Odoemena
Ag-AIM Solutions,
Lagos, Nigeria.
kelechiodoemena@gmail.com
Robert Lamb
Foundation for Inclusion,
Washington, DC, USA.
bob@foundationforinclusion.org
Monique Ann Tiongco
Ateneo de Manila University,
Quezon City, Philippines.
mtiongco@ateneo.edu
Stueti Gupta
BlueKei Solutions,
Maharashtra, India.
stueti.gupta@gmail.com
Arpitha Peteru
Foundation for Inclusion,
Washington, DC, USA.
arpitha@foundationforinclusion.org
The emergent COVID-19 pandemic has affected agriculture and food supply chains worldwide,
causing problems related to food production (Stephens et al., 2020), food loss and waste (Aldaco et al.,
2020), food access (Aday & Aday, 2020), and food security (Dev & Kabir, 2020), primarily due to
travel restrictions and lockdown regulations (Garnett, Doherty, & Heron, 2020; IPES, 2020; United
Nations, 2020). Similarly, shifts in consumer behavior, a consequence lockdown induced lifestyle
disruptions and psychological stress (Aldaco et al., 2020), have led to shortages or surpluses of certain
goods. The coping strategies employed by small-scale farmers due to the pandemic can result in broader
welfare implications (Haga, 2020; Galiano & Hernandez, 2008) and, thus, heightens the importance of
building resilience in these communities (Bhavani & Gopinath, 2020).
Agriculture and food supply chain resilience and vulnerability have been investigated in several
previous system dynamics modeling studies. As the major contribution of our study to the existing
literature, we aim to understand the disruptions to agriculture and food supply chain resilience under
the influence of a community health crisis.
The modeling purpose (objective) of our study is to investigate the short-term (i.e., months)
and medium-term (i.e., 1-2 years) effects of immediate COVID-19 related policy actions to facilitate
both input access and market access of small-scale producers, help maintain agricultural production,
and suppress the increasing food loss and waste at the farm level during health crises. Within the context
of this modeling purpose, the problem customers are defined as smallholder farmers, and the decision-
makers (i.e., problem owners) are selected as farming communities (including relevant unions and
cooperatives).
In this study, we focus on the presentation of problem definition, dynamic hypothesis
formulation, and qualitative model building stages as a starting point for the further steps of quantitative
model development and policy analysis. Consisting of series of project meetings, model building
sessions, individual and team assignments, project management activities, and eight team members
from diverse countries (India, Nigeria, Philippines, Sweden, Turkey, and the US) with different
perspectives on the issue, the work presented in this paper is an international, six-month-length system
dynamics modeling project which was entirely conducted in the online environments.
To understand and elaborate on the most urgent problems regarding COVID-19 and its effects
on agriculture and food supply chains, our team conducted an extensive review of both academic
publications and non-academic literature, such as policy briefs and reports published by governmental
and non-governmental organizations. The restrictions on transportation, input access, and market
access; shortage of farm inputs and workforce; plant shutdowns and disruptions along the production
lines; closure of food markets; and changes in consumer behavior and food demand constituted the
highlights of our review.
The study resulted in a stock-and-flow diagram consists of nine interacting sectors: (1) Food
Supply Chain, (2) Food Market, (3) Labor, (4) Agricultural Inputs, (5) Farm Finance, (6) Food Shelf
Life, (7) Community Health, (8) Information, and (9) Cooperation.
- Food Supply Chain: The Food Supply Chain includes the physical transformation and
transportation of the product from Food Growth to Food Consumption. During the pandemic, Food
Harvest is severely affected due to a decrease in Availability of Laborers. After the harvest, the
agriculture and food commodities can either be directly sold to consumers or put into storage (e.g., dry
storage, frozen storage) depending on the product characteristics (Olafsdottir & Sverdrup, 2019).
Hence, the importance of storage facilities increases under pandemic conditions. Food shipments also
play a vital role in the market access of the farmer communities, where the Transportation Capacity
can be driven by the farmer’s own assets or can be enhanced by cooperative structures within the
community.
- Food Market and Food Demand: The Food Market and Food Demand sector in our model
includes the major drivers of pandemic-related changes in the food market from the viewpoint of
farmers and farming communities. For a normal agriculture and food commodity, Food Demand per
Capita is expected to change with the effects of Disposable Income per Capita and Food Price at the
Consumer Level. With the increasing spread of the pandemic, the Effect of Panic Buying and Hoarding
acts as another short-term effect, whereas the decline in consumer income is expected to generate long-
term effects (Hobbs, 2020). Additionally, the Effect of Shifts due to Food Characteristics would be
another determinant since the demand for processed food has increased and the demand for fresh
products has decreased during the pandemic (CBI, 2020), and the shifts across product categories are
expected (Hobbs, 2020).
- Labor: Agriculture and food supply chains are labor-intensive, such that labor shortages due
to the effects of the lockdown cause several challenges and severe disruptions in the operations to a
large extent (Schmidhuber & Qiao, 2020; Stephens et al., 2020). Considering the COVID-19 pandemic,
Restrictions on the Accessibility of Laborers decreases Labor Available, and hence the Availability of
Laborers for the agricultural operations, which is observed to be mostly affecting the harvesting and
pre-sowing activities (Sahoo & Rath, 2020; Torero, 2020) as well as the food shipments. In terms of
the effects related to community health, Restrictions on the Accessibility of Laborers and Safety
Restrictions in the Working Environment are expected to decrease Infection Rate noticeably.
- Agricultural Inputs: The agricultural Input Usage Rate of a farm (including the use of seeds,
fertilizer, plant protection) is a key determinant of Food Growth and thus is a determining factor to the
total throughput of the food supply chain. In the case of large-scale shocks to the agricultural systems,
such as COVID-19, inputs may be available, but accessibility to the farm has become delayed as a result
of supply chain disruptions (BFAP, 2020). Evidence indicates that (Marlow, 2020; Pais et al., 2020;
Sun, 2020), the Effect of Pandemic on Input Supply is not homogenous but depends on local-regional
factors. More generally, there is a risk of experiencing more widespread local or regional shortages in
agricultural inputs in the coming season due to the effects of the pandemic on Farmer’s Profit and
future Input Cost. With the general slowdown of national and international trade, Input Cost per Unit
is likely to go up due to the pandemic. This will further reduce farmer’s purchasing power and suppress
the access to agricultural inputs for the coming season(s) (Pais et al., 2020).
- Farm Finance: The pandemic revealed the financial fragilities of rural farming communities
in many regions, especially where the income of farmers usually depends on their short-term – weekly
or daily – activities (Ali et al., 2020; IFAD, 2020). Many farms already have thin enough profit margins
in most years that the overall concern is using Farmer’s Revenue to maintain Farmer’s Liquidity in the
short-term. Now, of course, this concern is exacerbated by disruptions related to the COVID-19
outbreak. When revenue is not high enough to maintain the Farmer’s Liquidity, the farmer often has to
use credit to maintain liquidity. The Use of Credit increases Debt, which has two serious risks: 1)
Liquidity Risk and 2) Net Worth Risk. To prevent these risks, it is critical that the farmer finds new
sources of revenue when the agriculture and food supply chain is disrupted, and this is possible if the
farmer has information about where those potential sources of revenue are or if cooperation with other
farmers has created new opportunities.
- Food Shelf Life: Lockdowns introduced to combat the spread of the pandemic have resulted
in a general slowdown of the usual food supply chain logistics and an increase in food waste and food
loss due to the limited shelf life of fresh agriculture and food products. At the farm level, a pandemic-
related decrease in the operational capacity introduces longer lag times between the point of harvest
and the entry of the food into the designated cold chain. With more Food Loss at the pre-harvest and
post-harvest stages, it takes a longer time than usual to fill up a batch for shipment, thus increasing the
Time to Flow from Farmer to Post-Production. This delay increases the rate of Shelf Life Expiring
because the food is more exposed to pests and other environmental variables, increasing its rate of
degradation (Piergiovanni, 2019). The overall result is an increase in Food Loss and Food Waste along
the entire supply chain caused by extended time-delays, particularly at the farm level where food is left
exposed to the elements, waiting to enter the cold chain for transportation to post-production.
- Community Health: The Community Health sector represents the impact of the propagation
of disease within the community. If the Infected Local Population increases, it imposes Restrictions on
the Market Accessibility of Consumers, Safety Restrictions in the Working Environment, and
Restrictions on the Accessibility of Laborers to reduce the infection rate. Restrictions on the
Accessibility of Laborers leads to a decrease in food and agricultural production capacity, and then
creates excess workload on the available laborers. The excess workload increases Pressure in the
Working Environment, which could further lead to an increase in Infection Rate, causing further
Restrictions on the Accessibility of Laborers. Compulsory Safety Restrictions in the Working
Environment such as personal protective equipment is expected to decrease the Infection Rate but may
also create additional Pressure in the Working Environment.
- Information: In building resilient food systems, learning is a key process that contributes to
adaptations in dealing with changing and uncertain conditions (Mukhovi et al., 2020). Throughout every
step of the food supply chain, lack of access to timely information can lead to gaps in knowledge that
are critical to the resilience of farmers, especially the smallholders. These can include Information about
Credit Programs, Information about Markets, Information about Inputs, and of course, Information
about Food Loss at the Farm Level.
- Cooperation: Cooperation supports the establishment of local food networks and contributes
to the development of socially sustainable food systems (Hingley et al., 2011). From the viewpoint of
the farmers, cooperation represents a vital means to facilitate access to critical resources like input,
credit, labor, storage, and information, access to which have been negatively impacted by the pandemic.
Our results suggest that the most severe effects of the pandemic for many farmers might not be
observed in the short-term time horizon but in the medium-term. The pandemic has made it difficult for
small-scale farmers to harvest and transport goods due to the implementation of lockdown measures
and travel restrictions related to COVID-19. Such challenges were also associated with the increase of
food loss and food waste as food shelf life shortens due to suboptimal handling. Closure of restaurants
and schools resulted in more discarded perishable food, while changes in consumer behavior
significantly magnified food waste and purchases of non-perishables. These ultimately left farmers with
fewer customers and less profit, which may affect their ability to invest in future inputs due to a lack of
capital or credit.
A more troubling effect suggested by our findings is the irrecoverable coping strategies that
might be adopted by smallholder farmers as a consequence of the pandemic. Primarily, actions such as
sales of assets to stay in business can erode future productivity or, worse, lead to bankruptcy. This
feedback could potentially cascade failure in the food system despite the participation of small farms in
securing food for both rural and urban people. Moreover, our analysis suggests that the main impact of
the pandemic on small-scale farmers is not related to how much food is produced but rather to the
inability of farmers to handle produce when shocks to the supply chain occur. In the future, the
economic impacts of the pandemic, coupled with low demand and reduced access to the market, might
lead to lowered profit margins for the producing farmer communities.
Our study presents a general overview of the agriculture and food supply chain resilience from
the perspective of smallholder farmers and farming communities, and it serves as a starting point to
explore dynamic behavior and to facilitate individual and collaborative reasoning. To make case-
specific policy analysis and recommendations, stakeholder engagement and participatory modeling
studies, model quantification, and extensive validation of the model are still necessary.
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