This chapter reviews 11 guides for value-chain analysis and development. It compares the guides’ concepts, objectives, and methods and identifies strengths, weaknesses, and gaps. The assessment characterizes the state of the art for designing interventions and interactions that seek to build value chains with smallholders. The chapter is organized as follows: presents the methodology applied in carrying out the review, the following section presents the results of this review, and the final section provides concluding comments.

Governments, nongovernmental organizations, donors, and the private sector have increasingly embraced value-chain development (VCD) for stimulating economic growth and combating rural poverty. Innovation for Inclusive Value-Chain Development: Successes and Challenges helps to fill the current gap in systematic knowledge about how well VCD has performed, related trade-offs or undesired effects, and which combinations of VCD elements are most likely to reduce poverty and deliver on overall development goals. This book uses case studies to examine a range of VCD experiences. Approaching the subject from various angles, it looks at new linkages to markets and the role of farmer organizations and contract farming in raising productivity and access to markets, the minimum assets requirement to participate in VCD, the role of multi-stakeholder platforms in VCD, and how to measure and identify successful VCD interventions. The book also explores the challenges livestock-dependent people face; how urbanization and advancing technologies affect linkages; ways to increase gender inclusion and economic growth; and the different roles various types of platforms play in VCD.