This chapter synthesises evidence on the role, challenges, and transformation pathways of smallholder farmers in global food systems. It highlights the heterogeneity within the category “smallholder”—ranging across farm size, labour organisation, asset base, and market integration—and shows how these differences influence productivity and value-chain participation. Smallholders supply a large share of staples, horticulture, and export crops, yet capture limited value due to fragmented distribution networks, weak cold-chain infrastructure, and intermediation. Their productivity is constrained by liquidity gaps, insecure tenure, land fragmentation, poor infrastructure, gender and social inequities, digital exclusion, and growing climate risks, which together reinforce cycles of vulnerability. To address these barriers, the chapter proposes an integrated pathway combining climate-smart and agroecological practices—such as stress-tolerant seeds, conservation agriculture, agroforestry, and integrated pest management—with improved input delivery systems, including seed banks, irrigation technologies, mechanization pools, and smart subsidies. Complementary measures include gender-responsive interventions, digital governance, sustainable incentive schemes, and infrastructure upgrades in roads, irrigation, energy, and storage. Implementation is conceived as participatory and system-based, supported by cooperatives, blended finance, and farmer-centred data rights. Country illustrations from Rwanda, India, and Kenya demonstrate scalability and adaptability.