A Typology of Young Cocoa Farmers: Attitudes, Motivations and Aspirations

Abstract

This paper presents a typology to highlight and describe the variation in attitudes among young farmers in rural Ghana, a group that has been treated in policy discourses and in development practice as largely homogenous. It further identifies motivations and aspirations associated with each type. A cluster analysis of survey data from 120 respondents yielded two types of young farmers: 'positive' and 'resigned'. The likelihood of being in either category was found to be related to marital status, location, and whether one had a secondary occupation. Further, the 'positive' group was more likely to report being influenced by adult role models and more likely to aspire to stay in farming. Our findings underscore the relevance of socio-economic and ecological environment on young people's attitudes to and decisions regarding farming and, consequently, on the outcome of policy and programmatic interventions meant to increase their participation in agriculture. KeywordsRural development • Agriculture • Youth • Youth employment • Farmer typology • Ghana Résumé Cet article présente une typologie qui vise à mettre en évidence et à décrire les variations en termes d'attitudes chez les jeunes agriculteurs dans les zones rurales du Ghana, qui ont été considérés-dans les discours politiques comme dans la pratique des programmes de développement-comme un groupe globalement homogène. En outre, l'article identifie les motivations et les aspirations associées à chaque type. Une analyse par grappes des données d'enquête auprès de 120 participants a révélé deux types de jeunes agriculteurs: les « positifs» et les « résignés». La probabilité d'appartenir à l'une ou l'autre de ces catégories était liée à l'état matrimonial, à l'emplacement et à l'activité secondaire. De plus, le groupe des « positifs» était plus * Nana Akua Anyidoho

An Agricultural Career through the Lens of Young People

“…Young people admit that they have some difficulty in convincing their families to give them their own plot of land [51]. In fact, fathers tend to hang on to their decision of remaining in power into old age [52][53][54].…”

“…Despite their willingness to pursue a career in the sector, they do not see any opportunities to do so. According to Amon-Armah et al, one's opportunity space is shaped by personal experience as well as social, economic, and ecological environment [52]. Those who cannot inherit the land perceive acquiring it as extremely complicated.…”

Accounting for Heterogeneity among Youth: A Missing Link in Enhancing Youth Participation in Agriculture—A South African Case Study

“…For example, Chipfupa and Tagwi [33] applied the typology formulation approach to assess the potential for rural youth to participate in agriculture, considering key success characteristics such as access to livelihood assets, managerial skills, agricultural perceptions, and psychological capital (PsyCap). McKillop, Heanue and Kinsella [26] profiled young farmers on dairy and dry stock farms according to the differences in their innovativeness, while Armon-Armah et al [34] considered attitudes, motivations, and aspirations to formulate typologies of youth in cocoa farmers. However, in the typology formulation, PsyCap was used as a proxy to capture the dynamics of soft skills such as entrepreneurship, that are considered key in enhancing youth participation in agriculture.…”

“…Ignoring entrepreneurial characteristics of young people in characterising them means support interventions can overlook strategies that can facilitate engaging in agricultural activities as business ventures which leads to misrepresenting and narrowing the actual impediments of active engagement of youth in agriculture. McKillop et al [26] and Armon-Armah et al [34] only considered youth in specific enterprises in the typology formulation, which can limit the applicability of the typologies to all youth at different participation levels.…”

Labour relations and working conditions of workers on smallholder cocoa farms in Ghana

“…Despite the strong COCOBOD presence, issues of ethical consumption and sustainability in Ghana's cocoa sector are mostly governed by Global North lead firms through various sustainability initiatives (Barrientos and Asenso-Okyere 2009;Fold and Neilson 2016;Kolavalli and Vigneri 2018). In addition, Ghana's cocoa sector is characterised by labour fragmentation (Vigneri et al 2016), many unemployed youths who are uninterested in cocoa farming (Anyidoho et al 2012) and an increasing number of young farmers who perceive better opportunities outside of cocoa farming and are likely to leave (Amon-Armah et al 2022).…”