The meeting was held in order to bring together a number of experts on the subject ofcontract farming in sub-Saharan Africa to address four main issues: What are the best approaches to overcoming problems presently beingexperienced with contract farming in Africa? Such problems may include: (1) lackof political understanding and support; and (2) failure of both farmers andcompanies to honour contracts, thus placing sustainable development of contractfarming arrangements in jeopardy.What are the best approaches to linking companies to farmers (and vice versa)? What are the macro-level preconditions (the so-called “enabling environment”) forsuccessful contract farming?