Mali's agrifood system lacks transformation and is dominated by agriculture. Agricultural GDP and employment shares have barely changed between 2009-2019, with agriculture making up over half of GDP and two-thirds of employment. Growth has been driven by exportable and less-traded value chains, with oilseeds, rice, maize, pulses and root crops growing above average. Looking forward, jointly promoting oilseeds, pulses, sorghum and cattle/dairy could effectively achieve multiple development outcomes like reducing poverty and improving diets.

1. Mali’s Agrifood System
Structure and Drivers of Transformation
Xinshen Diao, Mia Ellis, Karl Pauw, Josee Randriamamonjy, and James Thurlow
International Food Policy Research Institute
This diagnostic analysis was conducted by IFPRI with financial support from USAID.
July 2023

2. Four Parts to the Diagnostics
• Current structure
What does Mali’s food system look like today?
• Decomposing value chains
How are different products contributing to the broader agrifood system?
• Growth and market structure
How is Mali’s agrifood system growing and transforming?
• Future drivers of inclusive agricultural transformation
Which value chains could be most effective?
2019
2009-2019
2019+

3. Summary
Mali’s agrifood system (AFS) diagnostic results
Mali’s AFS lacked transformation in the recent years
• Off-farm share of total AFS GDP was constant between 2009 and 2019
• Agricultural share of total GDP barely changed over time
• Agriculture continues to be the largest sector in Mali’s economy, both in GDP and employment
AFS growth has been driven by value chains oriented toward both the domestic market and for export
• Less-traded value chains dominate AFS growth with their large size
• Exportable value chains made an important contribution to AFS growth with above-average growth
Looking forward, the structure of AFS growth will be crucial in driving development outcomes…
(e.g., poverty, dietary improvement, employment creation, and growth)
…but no single value chain is the most effective at driving all these development outcomes
• Root crops and sorghum are most effective at reducing poverty; oilseeds and pulses are best for improving diet quality; cattle &
dairy and cotton have strong employment effects; and sorghum and other crops have large growth multiplier effects
Jointly promoting oilseeds, pulses, sorghum, and cattle & dairy would offer an effective way to
achieve multiple development outcomes

4. Framework | Agrifood Systems (AFS)
Primary agriculture
Agroprocessing
Trade and transport
Food services
Trade and transport
Input supply Demand
Consumption of own-
produced goods
Purchase of primary
agricultural goods
Purchase of processed
agrifood goods
Purchase of ready-made
foods outside of home
Imports
A
C
B
D
E
Includes agriculture, plus all upstream/downstream sectors
• Five major components (A to E)
• Same format as standard economywide datasets (e.g., national accounts)
• Allows us to measure AFS structure and performance using actual data
Agrifood System GDP (AgGDP+)
Total value added generated by all agricultural
value chains (in constant dollars)
Agrifood System Employment (AgEMP+)
Total number of workers who are primarily
employed in an agricultural value chain

5. Structure2019 | Mali’s Agrifood System Today
GDP and employment in Mali’s agrifood system (2019)
• Part 1 focuses on the current size and
structure of the national agrifood system
• Latest AgGDP+ and AgEMP+ estimates
• Decomposed into five AFS components
• Situates AFS within the broader economy
• Uses official data sources
• GDP from national accounts
• Employment from various sources (i.e., population
census, labor force surveys, ILO, etc.)
• Mali estimates indicate that
• AFS makes up more than half of GDP
($8.1 billion AgGDP+) …
• … and more than two-thirds of total employment
(4.7 million AgEMP+)
• Primary agriculture (A) is large, and off-farm
components (B–E) are small
(one-fifth of AgGDP+, only 13% of AgEMP+)
GDP
($ billions)
Employment
(millions of workers)
Total economy 15.8 100% 6.7 100%
Agrifood system 8.1 50.8% 4.7 70.8%
Primary agric. (A) 6.3 40.1% 4.2 62.4%
Off-farm AFS 1.7 10.8% 0.6 8.4%
Processing (B) 0.7 4.5% 0.0 0.6%
Trade & transport (C) 0.9 5.4% 0.5 7.3%
Food services (D) 0.1 0.3% 0.0 0.2%
Input supply (E) 0.1 0.5% 0.0 0.2%
Rest of economy 7.8 49.2% 1.9 29.2%

6. Structure2019 | Comparing to Other Countries
• Importance and structure of the AFS varies at different stages of development
Mali is a low-income country (LIC)
• A: Mali’s AgGDP+ share of total GDP is higher than the LIC average
• B: Mali’s primary agriculture component of AgGDP+ is larger than in most LICs
• C: Mali’s agro-processing is close to expected, while trade and transport is larger
Share of total GDP (%) Share of AFS GDP (%) Share of off-farm AFS GDP (%)
LIC = low-income countries | LMIC = lower-middle income | UMIC = upper-middle-income | HIC = high-income Source: IFPRI Agri-Food System Database
A B C
4.2
26.4
16.9
7.1
1.2
40.1
8.2
13.4
11.9
10.6
6.6
10.8
All LIC LMIC UMIC HIC Mali
Primary agriculture Off-farm AFS
34.0
66.2
58.6
40.2
15.6
78.8
66.0
33.8
41.4
59.8
84.4
21.2
All LIC LMIC UMIC HIC Mali
Primary agriculture Off-farm AFS
33.7 37.8 38.4
46.9
26.1
41.7
31.7
42.8 38.6 21.4
35.9
50.4
23.1
13.7
11.2
18.2 27.8
3.0
11.4 5.8 11.8 13.5 10.3 4.9
All LIC LMIC UMIC HIC Mali
Processing Trade and transport
Food services Input supply

7. Structure2019 | Supply vs. Demand Sides of the Agrifood System
Agrifood GDP vs. consumption
Primary, processed, and other product shares (%)
• AgGDP+ defines the AFS on the supply side
• Household demand and trade (imports) capture AFS structure on the demand side
• Agrifood processing is more important on the demand side than the supply side in the AFS
AgGDP+ Household demand
Agrifood exports vs. imports
Primary and processed product shares (%)
Exports ($0.48 bil.) Imports ($0.75 bil.)
78.8%
8.8%
12.3%
$0.48 bil.
100%
Primary agriculture
Agrifood processing
$0.61 bil.
81.4%
$0.14 bil.
18.6%
51.9%
45.5%
2.6%
Primary agriculture
Agroprocessing
Other off-farm

8. Value Chains2019 | Contributions & Trade Orientation
• Part 2 decomposes the AFS across broad value chain
groupings
• Classify value chains based on trade orientation
• Exportable value chains have above-average export-output ratios
(> 3.6%)
• Importable value chains have above-average import-demand
ratios (> 5.5%)
• Less-traded value chains make up the rest
• Four exportable value chains account for a sizable AFS
GDP (37%); larger on-farm (primary) share (39.4%) and
smaller off-farm share (29.5% of total)
• Oilseed value chain also has above-average import-to-demand
ratio; exports are seeds, while imports are cooking oils
• Two import value chains account for a disproportionate
share of off-farm AFS (39.9%); these value chains
compete with processed agrifood imports
• Seven less-traded value chains dominate agriculture GDP
(50.1%) and have the largest share of total AgGDP+
(46%); but with much smaller off-farm share (32.5%)
Promoting some importable value chains and oilseeds
(exportable) could be effective in driving agricultural
transformation by boosting value added and employment
in off-farm AFS
Share of total GDP (%) Exports /
output
(%)
Imports /
demand
(%)
Total
AFS
Primary
agric.
Off-farm
AFS
Total 100 100 100 3.6 5.5
Exportable 37.0 39.4 29.5 10.2 4.1
Oilseeds 4.8 4.4 6.3 6.4 9.2
Cotton 3.6 4.3 0.9 64.3
Cattle & dairy 23.6 25.0 18.3 3.9 2.7
Forestry 5.0 5.7 2.4 9.9 1.9
Importable 15.8 10.4 37.9 0.0 12.9
Rice 13.8 10.0 28.3 0.0 10.1
Other crops 2.0 0.5 7.5 0.0 28.3
Less traded 46.0 50.1 32.5 0.9 2.1
Maize 6.1 6.4 5.1 0.0 0.5
Sorghum 6.6 6.8 6.1 0.0 0.1
Pulses 1.0 1.2 0.4
Roots 1.0 1.3 0.1
Horticulture 13.0 13.8 9.9 0.7 4.1
Other livestock 11.7 14.1 2.6 2.6 0.4
Fish 6.5 6.6 6.4 0.0 5.2
Breakdown of Mali’s agrifood system (2019)

9. Growth2009-2019 | Agrifood System Performance
Mali’s AFS lacked transformation during 2009–2019
• Agricultural share of total GDP barely changed
• Share of off-farm in total AFS GDP was constant
Agricultural employment share fell modestly (69% to 62%), and the share was still very high in 2019
• Agriculture still dominates the economy and employment with low productivity
Agricultural GDP, agrifood system GDP, and employment shares (2009–2019)
• Part 3 analyzes structural change in the AFS and the contribution of different value chains to AFS growth
43.3
55.1
21.4
69.0
40.1
50.8
21.2
62.4
Agricultural GDP share AgGDP+ share Off-farm share of AgGDP+ Agricultural employment
share
Share
(%)
2009 2019

10. Growth2009-2019 | Value Chain Performance
• Modest AgGDP+ growth (4.1% p.a.) during
2009–2019
• Exportable value chains made an important
contribution to AFS growth with above-average
growth (4.4%), contributing nearly 40% of AFS
GDP growth
• Less-traded value chains made more
contribution to AFS growth with their large size,
but their total growth was below AFS average
(3.7%), contributing 43% of AFS growth
• Value chains with growth rate more than 5.0%
(*)
• Oilseeds – exportable
• Rice – importable
• Maize, pulses, root crops – less traded
• Off-farm growth is often slower than primary
agriculture growth in fast-growing value chains
Value chain growth in Mali (2009–2019)
Average annual GDP growth rate (%)
Total
AFS
Primary
agric.
Off-farm
AFS
Process-
ing
Total AFS 4.1 4.2 4.0 3.8
Exportable 4.4 4.5 4.0 4.1
Oilseeds* 5.0 5.4 4.2 5.0
Cotton 4.4 4.1 12.9
Cattle & dairy 4.7 4.9 3.8 3.9
Forestry 2.7 2.7 2.2 8.9
Importable 4.8 5.2 4.3 3.7
Rice* 5.5 6.1 4.7 4.3
Other crops 0.9 -4.6 2.9 2.3
Less traded 3.7 3.7 3.9 3.3
Maize* 5.2 6.1 2.1 0.8
Sorghum 4.6 4.7 4.1 2.9
Pulses* 8.7 9.0 5.9
Root crops* 6.0 6.1 3.6
Horticulture 3.3 3.1 4.7 4.2
Other livestock 4.4 4.4 5.8 6.9
Fish 0.9 0.3 3.4 4.1

11. Future Drivers2019+ | Modeling Faster Growth
• IFPRI’s RIAPA model is used to analyze different sources of agricultural growth
• Expand production in different value chains
• Increase on-farm productivity growth rates in targeted value chains
• Achieve same overall growth in agriculture GDP (e.g., 1.0%)
• Track linkage effect within value chain and spillover effects to other value chains
• Assess outcomes
• Poverty – Poverty-growth elasticity in percentage points based on $2.15-a-day
• Hunger – Hunger-growth elasticity in percentage points based on prevalence of undernourishment
• Diet – Diet quality to growth elasticity in % derived from Reference Diet Deprivation index (REDD)
• Jobs – Employment multiplier in thousand employed persons associated with US$1 million growth in targeted value chain
• GDP – GDP growth multiplier in US$ millions associated with US$1 million growth in targeted value chain
• Average across outcomes
• The value of outcome indicators (elasticity or multiplier) is expected to differ across value chain growth; not all value chains are
equally effective at achieving all outcomes
• Normalizing the individual outcome scores
• The values of each outcome indicator are scaled so that the most effective value chain is given a score of one and the leasteffective is given a
score of zero. A value chain with adverse impact is also given a score of zero.
• An average score with equal weights is used to measure the total impacts across all value chains

12. Individual outcomes
(per unit change in agriculture GDP, ordered by poverty outcome)
Future Drivers2019+ | Prioritizing Agricultural Growth
Poverty
(change in %-point)
Hunger
(change in %-point)
Jobs
(change in 1,000)
Diet quality
(change in %)
Average across outcomes
(averaged normalized scores, reordered)
GDP
(change in mil. $)
1.27
1.87
1.60
0.87
1.55
1.42
1.05
0.96
1.05
1.11
1.68
2.75
-0.03
0.18
0.07
0.25
0.11
0.21
0.16
0.13
0.13
0.05
0.51
-0.54
0.01
0.15
0.56
0.04
0.07
0.01
0.75
0.15
0.21
0.44
0.04
0.12
-0.96
-1.70
-1.13
-0.27
-1.34
-0.84
-0.32
-0.14
-0.02
0.01
-0.02
-0.15
-2.72
-0.97
-0.66
-0.64
-0.64
-0.54
-0.49
-0.20
-0.10
0.07
0.07
0.26
Root crops
Sorghum
Pulses
Cotton
Maize
Rice
Oilseeds
Other livestock
Fish
Horticulture
Cattle & dairy
Other crops
0.50
0.50
0.45
0.37
0.34
0.32
0.32
0.30
0.29
0.28
0.27
0.25
Oilseeds
Pulses
Sorghum
Cattle & dairy
Maize
Horticulture
Rice
Root crops
Other crops
Fish
Cotton
Other livestock
Total
Oilseeds
Pulses
Sorghum
Cattle & dairy
Maize
Horticulture
Rice
Root crops
Other crops
Fish
Cotton
Other livestock
Poverty Growth Jobs Diets

13. Future Drivers2019+ | Key Messages
AFS growth is pro-poor
• Growth led by most value chains reduces poverty, but root crops, sorghum, and pulses are most effective
AFS growth is effective in improving food security (hunger) and diet quality
• Most value chains reduce hunger; sorghum, maize, and pulses are most effective
• Most value chains improve diet quality; oilseeds, pulses, and horticulture are most effective
Agricultural growth creates jobs but not necessarily on-farm
• All value chains are associated with an increase in total employment, but most AFS jobs are created off-farm
• Cattle & dairy, cotton, and rice are the most effective value chains in creating jobs both in the overall economy and within AFS
Agricultural growth has strong growth multiplier effects, generating income beyond agriculture
• Sorghum, other crops, and cattle & dairy have stronger growth multiplier effects for total GDP growth
In conclusion, promoting multiple value chains can achieve broad impact
• No single value chain group is the most effective in achieving all the development outcomes we consider
• Oilseeds, pulses, sorghum, and cattle & dairy rank highly in the combined outcome scores for poverty, diet, jobs, and growth
• Oilseeds and pulses rank highly due to their important role in diet quality improvement
• Sorghum and cattle & dairy rank highly due to their important role in job creation and GDP growth
• These value chains grew more rapidly than the AFS average in the past, and promoting these value chains would offer an
effective way to achieve broad-based outcomes

14. Note: Value Chain Groups and Agricultural Sectors in Individual
VC Groups
Value chain group and their share
of AgGDP+
Individual products and their share of group's Agriculture GDP
Maize (6.1%) Maize 100%
Sorghum (6.6%) Sorghum 100%
Rice (13.8%) Rice 100%
Pulses (1.0%) Pulses 100%
Oilseeds (4.8%) Groundnuts 35.8% | Other oilseeds 64.2%
Roots (1.0%) Cassava 7.5% | Irish potatoes 42.6% | Sweet potatoes 38.2% | Other roots 11.7%
Horticulture (13.0%) Vegetables 47.6% | Nuts 9.6% | Bananas 4.1% | Other fruits 38.8%
Cotton (3.6%) Cotton 100%
Other crops (2.0%) Sugarcane 60.0% | Other crops 40.0%
Cattle & dairy (23.6%) Cattle meat 65.2% | Raw milk 34.8%
Other livestock (11.7%) Poultry meat 25.0% | Eggs 2.9% | Small ruminants 65.5%| Other livestock 6.6%
Fish (6.5%) Aquaculture 6.0% | Captured fish 94/0%
Forestry (5.0%) Forestry 100%