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Jumat, 25 April 2008

Why we Need a New Agenda

Throughout history, increases in agricultural sector productivity have contributed
greatly to economic growth and the reduction of poverty. The past 30 years have seen
global successes in food production lead to an overall decline in world food prices;
increased caloric intake; reductions in the percentage of undernourished people; and
boosted rates of return to some key investments in agriculture.
We know that economic growth is essential for reducing poverty and that agriculture
has in many places connected broader economic growth and the rural poor, increasing
their productivity and incomes. Those higher rural incomes increase the demand for
consumer goods and services, in turn stimulating the rural economy, boosting growth and
reducing poverty even further. Agricultural sector growth reduces poverty by harnessing
the productive capacity of the poor’s key assets of land and labour, by lowering and
stabilising food prices, by providing labour-intensive employment for the poor and by
stimulating growth in the rural economy.
In recent decades, however, this virtuous set of relationships has been threatened.
New global trading conditions have been disadvantageous to poorer producers. Developing
countries continue to give high levels of protection to their own markets. Recent policies
for economic restructuring have not produced positive results. Gaps opened by the removal
of public support to agriculture have not been filled by the private sector. And public
investment in agriculture has declined.
At the same time, the focus on reducing poverty has sharpened. International donors
and national governments are targeting poverty more explicitly, through new and more
effective approaches. But these efforts have not yet given enough attention to what
economic growth can do to reduce poverty or how agriculture can contribute to that growth.
This is the new context for agricultural policy, and a new agriculture agenda is needed
to address it. The new agenda must promote investments in higher productivity activities
and links to new market opportunities in urban centres and in regional and global markets.
In tandem with improved productivity, it must encourage the development of the broader
agricultural sector and rural economy, so that the benefits from agriculture can be realised.
It must also make it easier for small producers and landless agricultural workers to
diversify out of agricultural production. And it must reduce risk and vulnerability across
the rural world. In short, there has to be a shift from a traditional sectoral agenda for
agricultural production to a broader agenda for the agricultural sector and rural
livelihoods.

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