Colombia's agricultural pricing policy needs in-depth participatory inquiry to achieve SDG 2

A feedback node in the data inflow for participatory monitoring of SDGs indicates the agricultural pricing policies in Columbia as very poor.

Colombia is the second-largest coffee producer in the world with about 20 per cent of all cultivated land in the country used to grow mild Arabica beans which are mostly exported.

The country is also second-largest exporter of cut flowers with an industry worth of around US$1 billion per year. Other major agro produces include bananas, sugarcane, rice, maize, cotton, beans, oil palm, tobacco and a range of tropical fruits.

A review of agricultural policies of Colombia in 2015 by OECD indicates that the price support for the majority of agricultural products is provided through trade protection in the country.

Other policy instruments related to price support include a minimum guaranteed price programme for cotton and price stabilization funds administered by producers' associations.

Colombia adopts a national roadmap towards SDGs.

Colombia adopted a national roadmap toward the #SDGs and published it online so that any citizen could access this information and measure the progress the country is making. Why is it important to measure SDG progress? Read our blog here: https://t.co/f6xZX17dBW #HLPF pic.twitter.com/E4nXxVLequ

— UN Foundation (@unfoundation) July 17, 2018

Agricultural pricing policy refers to interventions by the government to influence the prices of inputs consumed and outputs produced by the agriculture. Fixing the support prices of agricultural produce by the government and input pricing such as subsidies on agriculture inputs like seeds, fertilizers, water, electricity, fuels, pesticides, machinery, and farm credit are inter-related aspects since the cost of production determines the prices of outputs.

Debate on agricultural pricing policy range from advocacy of support prices for key agro commodities and subsidies for major inputs to complete liberalization of prices and letting the market mechanism achieve efficiency and competitiveness.

Market Price Support (MPS), which is directly linked to commodity output and can have a significant effect on production, is the predominant component of producer support in Colombia (90% on average for the period 1992-2013). Products like rice, maize, poultry, sugar, milk, and pigmeat have been major components of the MPS. This estimation greatly coincides with Colombia's use of the Andean Price Band System for some of these products.

As per OECD, MPS is less effective in increasing producer income than other types of support like direct payments to farmers which is less attached to commodity output. Market price support also imposes additional costs on domestic consumers. On the other hand, support which is not based on commodity output, such as payments per hectare or direct income support, can be more effective to improve farmer incomes, to achieve environmental or rural development objectives, as well as have less spill-over effects on international trade.

Ending the hunger, achieving food security and improving the nutrition, and promoting sustainable agriculture is Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 with target of doubling the agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers, in particular women, indigenous peoples, family farmers, pastoralists and fishers, including through secure and equal access to land, other productive resources and inputs, knowledge, financial services, markets and opportunities for value addition and non-farm employment.

Participatory monitoring of SDGs being done by Devdiscourse aims at generating the data needed to close the information gaps and achieve the evidence base needed for robust implementation of the SDGs. As part of such monitoring, data is being collected as feedback from volunteers across the world online and through an android app on various aspects including the feedback on the policies of and assistance from respondents' government on agricultural pricing policies.

A feedback node from the participatory monitoring data stream indicates the agricultural pricing policies in Columbia as very poor. Why so? Despite MPS being the predominant component of producer support in Colombia, such a feedback asks for an in-depth participatory inquiry in agriculture pricing policies of the country by involving the target beneficiaries.