Family Farming: a Europe and Central Asia Perspective

This is a background report for the FAO ‘Regional Dialogue on Family Farming: Working towards a strategic approach to promote food security and nutrition’. The paper analyses the barriers and facilitators faced by family farmers in Europe and Central Asia (ECA). It suggests four possible pathways for the universe of family farms: Growth, Disappearance, Transformation and Continuation. Each pathway has different importance in different ECA countries depending on the overall structure of economy and agriculture, and the ease or difficulty of farmers’ access to land, other resources and markets. The paper argues that efforts should be made by FAO and its partners in the following areas (i) improved statistics on farm structures and farm household incomes in order to monitor the development of different types of family farm, their sources of income, food security situation and their policy needs, and (ii) annual monitoring of agricultural policies and rural development as they affect family farming and farmers.