Institutional procurement programmes are spreading throughout Africa, as they offer opportunities for economic inclusion in rural areas by enhancing market access. They can also contribute to increasing income levels, strengthening households’ investments and improving food and nutrition security, in line with the human right to adequate food (De Schutter 2014). Nevertheless, the lack of evidence on the development of such programmes in their various International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth modalities—home-grown school feeding, strategic stockpiling etc.—particularly in the sub-Saharan context, and on their livelihood impacts is hindering their potential expansion and development into public policies. To meet the growing interest in including agricultural interventions in social protection initiatives in Africa, it is necessary to focus on the tools that are deployed in these various types of initiatives (SOFA 2015). Indeed, linking social protection instruments such as school feeding with institutional market initiatives improves the sustainability of such programmes. For this purpose, it is important to start by identifying the potential of the vulnerable households that could benefit from market access. In this context, the very positive results achieved by the PAA Africa programme in terms of farmers’ productivity and increasing capacity to market their production surplus highlight the potential of local purchases from small-scale farmers, despite challenges such as production deficits and insufficient incomes among farmers, who also lack access to technical services and inputs.