This report presents the findings from a baseline survey of farmers conducted as part of IFPRI’s impact evaluation of a sub-component of the food security component of the THABAT project in Sudan. The report documents farmers’ pre-intervention conditions across agricultural production, input access, climate-smart practices, food security, market conditions, and institutional trust in the three states in which the project is being implemented—Kassala, Northern, and River Nile.
Sudan’s ongoing conflict has severely disrupted agricultural systems, markets, and rural livelihoods. The Sudan Enhancing Community Resilience Project (THABAT) provides resilience-oriented agricultural support that is critical for sustaining food production, protecting livelihoods, and supporting local economic recovery (‘thabat’ in Arabic means ‘stability’ or ‘firmness’). The project is a USD 130 million initiative financed through the Sudan Transition and Recovery Support Trust Fund (STARS) Multi-Donor Trust Fund. This report focuses on Component 2 of the project, which aims to enhance food security through directly providing agricultural production inputs, both goods and services, to farmers.
The baseline survey covered 1,308 beneficiary farmers from 115 farmer organizations across the three project states during the 2025/26 agricultural year. The main findings from the analysis of the survey data include: • Beneficiary farmers demonstrate relatively strong agricultural production potential despite operating in a fragile and conflict-affected environment. • Agricultural input support from the THABAT project reached most households, especially climate-adapted improved seeds for wheat, sorghum, and vegetables, and DAP and urea inorganic fertilizers. • However, adoption of climate-smart and adaptive agricultural practices, beyond the use of climate‑adapted improved seeds and fertilizers, generally remains low. • The food security indicators of beneficiary farmers are stronger than those seen in broader crisis-affected populations in Sudan. However, food insecurity levels vary substantially across the three project states. • Farmers continue to face major structural constraints to their economic activities that are related to inflation and currency fluctuations. They also face significant barriers in accessing markets, financial services, and technology, and are subject to substantial conflict-related risks.
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