World Development Report: Agriculture for Development

Abstract

As three out of every four people in developing countries dwell in rural areas today, agriculture continues to hold prime importance in the development and poverty reduction context. This 30th issue of the World Development Report (WDR) is divided into three parts and eleven chapters. The first part addresses the question of what agriculture can do for development while the second part shifts its focus towards the instruments that can be used to spur development through agriculture. Finally, the third section provides the policy recommendations for governments and other stakeholders on how the ‘agriculture for development’ agenda can be implemented in research and practice. The report focuses on two major regional challenges that require immediate attention. first in Sub-Saharan Africa, agricultural productivity growth is vital for generating overall economic growth. However in order to stimulate growth, small holder and subsistence farmers will need to adopt productivity enhancing practices which the report has discussed in detail. Secon, in Asia the report identifies the management of urban-rural income disparities as the most pressing challenge since “Asia’s fast growing economies remain home to over 600 million rural people living in extreme poverty”. In order to address this issue, the report proposes a mix of policies that can create high value agricultural jobs in rural areas, decentralise non farming economic activities to rural areas, and assist local people diversify into non-agricultural jobs. The report also discusses the issue of managing the scarcity of natural resources such as water and land and its relationship to agriculture and suggests ways of reducing agriculture’s environental footprint. The final section of the report is the pertinent discussion that brings at the fact that the above mentioned challenges can only be met if the required political will is present in the developing countries. The ultimate success will also depend on how well are the national governments able to collaborate with the international community and the local stakeholders.