This primer from the Transnational Institute describes the diversity of pastoralist systems that are found around the world. Among other topics, it explains the similarities and differences between pastoralists and peasants; explores the ways in which pastoralists have inaccurately been blamed for desertification; argues that anti-livestock narratives should not conflate pastoralism and industrial livestock farming; and asks to what extent animal-sourced foods are important for nutrition.

Inclusion of smallholders in modern (i.e. formal and globalised) food supply chains may not bring the benefits that it was expected to, according to this working paper from the International Institute for Environment and Development. Based on a literature review and stakeholder interviews, it concludes that smallholders’ access to higher-value markets probably results in only small income gains with most benefits going to the farmers who were wealthier to start with; that farmer cooperatives can be exclusionary; that despite high awareness of gender issues, there has been little progress on outcomes; and that it is difficult to quantify progress on the outcomes of environmental sustainability standards.

This book offers a holistic study of traditional Mexican agriculture, examining how it has changed according to environmental, climatic, geographical, social and cultural conditions. It sets out practices and knowledge that can inform sustainable agroecological systems.

This paper analyses satellite data and finds that the annual rate of carbon loss from tropical forests has doubled between the time periods 2001-05 and 2015-19, primarily driven by agricultural expansion.

This paper assesses four recent influential publications on food - the EAT Lancet Commission, the World Resources Report, Growing Better from the Food and Land Use Coalition and the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land. It argues that they do not give enough attention to the livelihoods of food producers, particularly poorer rural people. The authors note that only a limited subset of smallholder producers are likely to be able to escape poverty through growth in their agricultural productivity.

This book explores the 2018 United Nations' Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP). It features sections on specific groups of rights holders (including peasants, indigenous peoples, women and small-scale fishers), access to and control of natural resources (such as land, water, seeds and food), governance of food and agriculture, and examples of the potential impact of the UNDROP in Kenya, Greece, the European Union more broadly, Brazil and India.

This paper identifies three ways in which digital technologies can support the participation of smallholders in food sustainability: “the tutorial”, “the dashboard” and “the platform”. It is based on 10 case studies of digital sustainability initiatives that use remote sensing technologies (e.g. drones, satellites and sensors), collection of social and economic data, and technologies that allow the creation of a digital identity (e.g. blockchain contracts and digital marketplaces).

In this article for The Counter, author Sarah Mock describes her research with farmers across the United States. In writing her book, she originally set out to prove that agriculture should be organised around small family farms, but found that few farms of this type were financially stable. Instead, she delves into why small family farms are romanticised in the United States, discussing the history of land enclosure and subsidies.