The Ambiguous Effects of Policy Reforms on Sustainable Agricultural Intensificaton in Africa : Renewed Threats to Fragile Margins?

This book chapter presents evidence and explanation on the midex effects market-oriented policy reforms have had on sustainable agricultural intensification in Africa, focusing in particular on incentives to clear forest for cultivation. Much policy reform has been blind to the net effects on smallholder production incentives, focusing excessively on macro-level reforms that have often just laid bare underlying structural weaknesses in rural markets, sometimes reversing policies that induced sustainable intensification