Business clustering has been pin-pointed by the Ethiopian government as the primary method of improving farmer income. These recommendations build on the Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Agency’s (ATA) Agricultural Commercialization Cluster (ACC) Initiative which aims to double the income of five million smallholder farmers over five years.
FiftyEight recommends adapting clustering to be child labour-focused, building geographical and commodity-based coalitions of farmers, centred on improving access to markets, adding value for farmers, and reducing reliance on child labour.
Although centred on an Ethiopian agricultural model, it has implications for other fragile agricultural contexts where child labour is prevalent.