Living Income in Latin America: Strategies, Impacts and Development
Living Income in Latin America: Strategies, Impacts and Development
On 19th of June, the Living Income Community of Practice hosted a workshop, featuring expert speakers from ofi, CLAC, CRECE, IDH, and Rikolto, to give a snapshot of the many initiatives working on advancing living income in Latin America. Building on rising interest on the topic of living income, this workshop took a regional focus on the strategies used in different industries in Latin America to identify and bridge the income gap.
Key lessons the panels shared with us in bridging the income gap in LAC:
- Inclusion of Smallholder Producers: Engaging smallholder producers in the decision-making process allows them to share insights, experiences, and aspirations. This ensures that strategies are tailored to their specific needs and helps to encourage greater ownership, needed for success.
- Inclusive Strategies: Effective strategies must consider the diverse perspectives of smallholder producers on income improvement, activities, welfare, and aspirations. Gender and generational inclusion are a critical part of this, and the LAC region has some excellent case studies on this to draw on.
- Multiple Intervention Strategies: Educational and social interventions, such as collaborating with schools and creating opportunities for farmers to learn new techniques and skills, are essential. Working in partnership with expert organisations on these types of interventions help to build capacity and improve livelihoods.
- Tailored Approaches: Customising strategies for different producers and sectors ensures the most effective outcomes and allows for sector specific challenges to be addressed. For instance, ofi and Aldi’s project in Honduras grouped farmers based on their aspirations and income levels, empowering them with targeted interventions. This relates closely to the inclusion point shared above.
- Integrating Supply Chains: It is crucial to incorporate supply chain decisions into strategies, as these impact smallholder producers. All actors, including supermarkets, must recognise how their pricing and contracting models affect the achievement of living incomes.
- Diversification Strategies: Diversification helps smallholder producers manage and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Coupling diversification with other strategies allows producers to expand their income sources and supply goods to local and regional markets. Companies should explore alternative value distributions that could increase revenue for smallholder producers, possibly in partnership with NGOs who are active in market development.
- Research Partnerships: Collaborating with research institutions and commissioning studies can provide valuable insights. For example, IDH’s study with CRECE examined the income gap for coffee producers and highlighted regional and demographic differences. Such studies foster collaboration and inform tailored approaches.
- Multistakeholder Regional Projects: Initiatives such as the Cajamarca Coffee Platform (mesa tecnica), supported by Rikolto, demonstrate the importance of involving representatives from public, private, civil society and academia. Successful multistakeholder projects require a clear, balanced, and neutral governance structure aligned with national commitments. A shared vision and coordinated actions that address critical issues and can be translated into policies, strategies, programs, and projects promoting sustainable development are key to building resilient strategies.
Reducing the income gap requires a multistakeholder and mixed strategy approach that reflects regional contexts and the specific needs of small holder producers and their sector. Inclusive and tailored approaches are crucial for building resilient strategies that can effectively address the income gap and help establish a living income for smallholder producers.
This workshop is part of LICOP’s 2024 regional focus on Latin America and strategies to bridge the living income gap. To stay informed, subscribe here.
