Living Lab: Small farmers receive better fiscal information in a confusing informational landscape

Giurgiu County, Romania

The aim of the Romanian Living Lab was to develop innovative support services and tools that improved access to reliable and timely financial information for small scale vegetable growers working together in a cooperative in southern Romania.

Context, theme and target group

Romania has a weak and fragmented agricultural advisory system and small farmers especially find it hard to navigate the basic statutory obligations they must comply with, particularly when complicated by frequent changes in legislation. Many of the of the problems associated with the small farm sector, including low productivity, little investment and poor absorption of European funds, relate to a lack of proper guidance – including on the key issue of financial management.Meanwhile, many small farmers (especially those with aspirations to become more commercial) share a sense of frustration and an urgent need to improve their situation. This was the situation observed in Vărăști village located in Giurgiu County approximately 30 km from the capital city of Bucharest.

Vărăști is well-known for having an innovative cooperative of small-scale vegetable growers (most of them having less than 1 ha) that has been actively supported and promoted by the Carrefour supermarket chain, the second biggest supermarket retailer in Romania. Carrefour was instrumental in the establishment of the cooperative and to-date has been its primary customer, reportedly sourcing almost 40% of its fresh produce from the cooperative in recent years for selling in stores across the whole of Romania.

Membership of the Vărăști cooperative grew rapidly during its first years of activity and members benefitted greatly from the support of the horticultural advisors provided by Carrefour. However, as their production increased the members of the cooperative struggled to keep up with the growing administrative burden of running their individual businesses, the on-going changing financial legislation, and their general lack of entrepreneurial and business management skills.

During consultation with the leaders of the cooperative a clear and urgent need was identified for easy-to-read and up-to-date guidance on financial management, including simple step-by-step guidance on the critically important issue of preparing annual tax declarations.

Partner and contact person

Highclere Consulting (HCC)

Raluca Barbu, raluca@highclere-consulting.com

HCC is a privately-owned consulting company based in Brasov, Romania. Established in 2006, the company provides hands-on consultancy, training and policy analysis services for governmental and non-governmental organisations in the field of rural development and sustainable agriculture in South Eastern Europe.

highclere-consulting.com

The Living Lab story

HCC had experience of working with small farmers in Giurgiu County from the Horizon 2020 SALSA project (www.salsa.uevora.pt). During this period it was observed that the Vărăști community was particularly suitable for implementing the AgriLink Living Lab concept since a strong collaborative spirit existed together with a very specific challenge that was impacting directly upon the profitability and quality of life of small-scale vegetable growers in the village.

The Living Lab started with a comprehensive needs assessment conducted at the beginning of 2018. Following this it was decided to focus the Living Lab upon:Connecting the most motivated and active members of the Vărăști cooperative with appropriate experts to define and co-create a straightforward guidance booklet on financial management for small-scale vegetable growers.Disseminating this guidance to as many of the 150 members of the Vărăști cooperative as possibleExploring the replication of the financial guidance booklet in a different region of Romania with other types of farmers.

Numerous meetings were held during 2018 in the Vărăști community and cooperative members were encouraged to discuss openly and in detail the specific challenges they faced with managing the financial aspects of their businesses. A highly experienced financial advisor from another region of Romania was introduced to the Living Lab participants and with the support of the HCC team this expert worked directly with the vegetable growers to elaborate the first version of the financial guide. Special care was taken during this process to customize and craft the content of the guidance booklet to the specific needs of the vegetable producers.

During late 2018 / early 2019 the financial guide was tested with cooperative members using participatory training and feedback sessions. Over 75% of the small-scale vegetable growers that participated in this process correctly submitted their annual fiscal declarations for 2019.

Lessons learned

Access to clear information and expert advice
Small farmers in Romania are looking for clear information that is delivered in a simple language. They also appreciate the opportunity to discuss their problems and questions directly with experts without the fear of being penalized. The novelty of the Living Lab approach for the vegetable growers in Vărăști was the opportunity for both fast access to necessary information and expert support – plus an outcome (the guidance document) that has continued to support them after the Living Lab finished.

Association and involvement
Small farmers can be more easily engaged by innovative advisory tools and services when they are organized in cooperatives. Furthermore, when they sense / experience both the individual and collective usefulness of the information received they also become willing to pay for these services. This was observed in Vărăști.

Keep it simple
The financial guide co-created in the Romanian Living Lab was a very useful and effective advisory tool for the small-scale vegetable growers in Vărăști. There was nothing similar available to them! Despite its simplicity it was clearly innovative. Do not under-estimate the power of simplicity!

Replicability
The Living Lab method is very flexible and with more time it would have been very straightforward to extend the Lab to other parts of Romania and other sectors to continue developing the financial guide. Several organisations and businesses (LEADER Local Action Groups, meat and dairy farming cooperatives, regional tourism operators etc.) expressed interest in adapting and disseminating it.

More info about the Romanian Living Lab (in English)

Practice Abstract 9 – Problem analysis in Living Lab: What is the value of an advisory service? – the case of a vegetable growers’ cooperative in Romania (Highclere Consulting)

Articles about Living Lab on HCC website:

Articles about Living Lab on AgriLink websites:

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