Land and labor dynamics in the future of African transformation

撒哈拉以南非洲农业的土地和劳动力动态正在迅速变化。城市投资者拥有的中型农场的比例不断上升，从根本上影响了土地分配，导致土地整合加剧，并排挤小农户。越来越多的非农就业机会正在推动农村工人离开农业，农村工资也在上涨。这两种趋势都受到农业食品体系转型的推动，因为城市化和不断壮大的中产阶级正在导致对更多样化和加工食品的需求不断增加。与此同时，与其他发展中地区相比，土地生产力和作物产量仍然极低。到目前为止，还没有同时研究非洲不断扩大的农场规模和非农劳动力机会之间的相互依存关系对农业生产率的影响。因此，在何种条件下，大规模农业和非农业经济驱动的转型可以成为非洲国家成功的发展道路，或者目前的土地和劳动力动态是否会通过排挤小农和增加贫困而导致经济停滞，这些社会相关问题仍然没有答案。“非洲转型未来的土地和劳动力动态（LANDYN）”研究项目旨在通过同时调查非洲国家不断扩大的农场规模和非农劳动力机会如何影响：(1)微观经济层面的农业生产率，(2)宏观经济层面的收入分配和乘数，来回答这个问题。LANDYN将在微观经济层面对加纳、坦桑尼亚和马拉维的农业生产率进行实证调查，并将这些见解整合到一个可计算的一般均衡模型中，以评估非洲转型路径的未来，同时考虑宏观经济反馈。

The dynamics of land and labor in Sub-Saharan African agriculture are rapidly changing. A rising share of medium-sized farms owned by urban investors is fundamentally affecting land distribution, leading to increased land consolidation and crowding out of smallholder farmers. Increasing off-farm employment opportunities are driving both rural workers out of agriculture and rural wages up. Both trends are driven by agri-food system transformation, as urbanization and a growing middle class are leading to increasing demand for more diverse and processed food. At the same time, land productivity and crop yields are still extremely low compared to other developing regions. So far, the influence of the mutual interdependencies between rising farm sizes and off-farm labor opportunities on agricultural productivity in Africa have not been simultaneously studied. Accordingly, the social relevant question under which conditions a large-scale agriculture and non-farm economy driven transformation can be a successful development path for African countries or whether current land and labor dynamics rather result in a stagnating economy through crowding out of smallholders and increases in poverty remains unanswered. The research project "Land and labor dynamics in the future of African transformation (LANDYN)" aims at answering the question by simultaneously investigating how increasing farm sizes and off-farm labor opportunities in African countries affect i) agricultural productivity on the microeconomic level and ii) the income distribution and multipliers on the macroeconomic level. LANDYN will empirically investigate agricultural productivity at the microeconomic level in Ghana, Tanzania, and Malawi and integrate these insights into a computable general equilibrium model to assess the future of African transformation pathways while accounting for macroeconomic feedbacks.