Facilitating Smallholder Farmers’ Market Access
In the OIC Member Countries
11
In the next stage, transition 1, the relative importance of agricultural GDP declines as the
other economic sectors start to expand. In transition 1 countries, agriculture accounts for
less than 25 percent of value added but provides more than 50 percent of employment.
About 10 percent of OIC members would be classified as transition 1; once again, they are
all in SSA. In transition 2 countries, less than 50 percent of employment is directly in
primary agriculture. About 24 percent of OIC member countries are classified as transition
2 countries; they include a couple of large countries in East and South Asia (Indonesia,
Bangladesh, and Pakistan), several countries in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) (Turkey,
Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Albania), and a few in the Middle East and North Africa
(MENA) and SSA (Yemen, Oman, Côte d’Ivoire, and Gabon). The number of people in
poverty (that is, below the US$ 2 per day international poverty line) falls as countries
move out of the transition 1 stage.
The next group of countries is classified as urbanizing. Agricultural employment in these
countries is below 25 percent, and agricultural GDP is relatively less important in the
overall economy than it is among the transforming and agriculture-based countries. This
group comprises 19 percent of OIC members, primarily countries in ECA and in MENA
(Egypt, Iran, and Morocco, for example). The group also includes one East Asian country
(Malaysia).
Finally, in urban economies, the primary agricultural sector generates less than 10 percent
of employment and GDP. Countries classified as urban are located in MENA and include
OIC members such as Saudi Arabia and Jordan. In both urbanizing and developed
economies, the reduction in direct farm employment is partially offset by the increasing
number of jobs created in the overall food supply chain.
FIGURE 1: OIC MEMBER COUNTRIES BY AGRICULTURAL CLASSIFICATION
Source: Authors, based on World Bank, forthcoming.