Subsistence farming

Like most farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa, this Cameroonian man cultivates at the subsistence level.

Subsistence farming, also known as Subsistence agriculture, is a mode of agriculture in which a plot of land produces only enough food to feed the family working it. It is a harsh way of living. Good weather may occasionally allow them to produce a surplus for sale or barter, but surpluses are rare. Because surpluses are rare, subsistence farming does not allow for growth, the accumulation of capital or for much specialization of labor. The farming family is left almost entirely without implements or goods that it cannot produce by itself. The amount of land needed to sustain the family living on it varies widely, anywhere from 1,000 and 40,000 m² (0.25 and 10 acres) per person. This depends on factors such as climate, soil conditions, agricultural practices, and the crop being grown.

Subsistence farming is usually organic, simply for lack of money to buy industrial inputs such as fertilizer and pesticides and genetically modified seeds. However, it is not always sustainable agriculture, as such techniques as slash and burn agriculture are common for instance in rainforest regions.

Cash crops are not motive of subsistence agriculture, although excess of traditional crops can often be sold in towns, or, more likely rare foodstuffs can be gathered in the wild and sold. The bushmeat trade is such a sideline — hunting of wild animals to feed the cities.

In many developing nations subsistence farming is still a way of life. Each region has a few traditional crops and methods to grow them by and this amounts to little more than gardening on a large scale.

Contributing factors

In the absence of a well developed commercialized agricultural sector, with monetary demands on the producer, such as taxes, the agricultural producer has relatively little incentive to move beyond subsistence farming. Expending effort to produce surpluses generates very little benefit, so the extra effort is usually wasted. Unfortunately, under these conditions years with poor harvests often result in food scarcity and famine.

Not all farmers have access to as much land as they can cultivate. Socioeconomic conditions may prevent an expansion of farming plots. If inheritance traditions require that a plot be split among the owner's children upon his death, plot sizes can steadily decrease.

The Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto has argued that one obstacle to industrial development is that subsistence farmers can not convert their work into capital which can be used to start new businesses and trigger industrializations. He argues that these obstacles exist often because subsistence farmers do not have clear title to the land which they work and to the crops which they produce.

Mitigation tactics

Many techniques have been attempted (with varying degrees of success) to help subsistence farmers to produce surpluses so the community can begin the path to economic growth.

Food aid can alleviate a short famine, but does nothing to solve the inherent problem of subsistence production. It is no longer considered a long-term solution.

Education about modern agricultural techniques has had some limited success, but not as much as was originally hoped. Many instructors discovered that their techniques depended on infrastructure, climate or resources which are not available in the subsistence community.

Another approach to education has been to provide the farmers with non-agricultural marketable skills. The implicit assumption is that the subsistence farmer will leave the community to seek employment in an area where greater resources are available. This technique has met with marginal success because it often ignores the human desire to stay with community.

In recent years, some attention has been given to developing underutilized crops, particularly in Africa and South-East Asia.

Proper irrigation techniques can dramatically improve the output of farmland. Traditional irrigation methods can be extremely labor-intensive, wasteful of water, and may require community-wide infrastructure which is difficult to implement. There are new types of irrigation equipment available which are both inexpensive and water-efficient. Many subsistence farmers, however, remain unaware of the new technologies, are unable to afford them, or have difficulties marketing their crops after investing in irrigation equipment.

Genetically modified crops (ex. golden rice) can have higher nutrient content or disease resistance than natural varieties. This technique has been highly successful in some parts of the world, though the long-term ecological and epidemiological effects of these crops are poorly understood.

Micro-loans, loans of very small sums of money (often less than $25), can enable farmers to purchase equipment or draft animals. Alternatively, micro-loans can enable farmers to find non-agricultural occupations in their communities.

Subsistence farming exists nowadays in Botswana, Benin, Bolivia, Congo, Guinea, Kikuyu, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Mexico, Yugoslavia, Polynesia, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Vietnam and multiple other countries.

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