AGRICULTURE AND POVERTY

Agriculture serves as a major source of income for nearly 49 percent of the world population. Fifty-five out of 147 countries identified by the World Bank for World Development Indicators are predominantly agriculture-based economies, with 25 of them having threefourths of their population eking out a living on farms—and these, interestingly, are located mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and southeast Asia. It is disheartening to note that majorities of the people bearing the brunt of abject poverty (living below poverty line) are members of the farming community worldwide, which underlines the importance of agriculture development  in uplifting people from poverty. Agriculture and poverty are closely interrelated. And that agriculture forms the backbone of the economy is well-known.
Perhaps nowhere is the link between agriculture and poverty more apparent than in the Third World. Out of the 55 predominantly agriculture-based nations (where more than half of the population depends on agriculture for living) only 18 (Albania, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, etc.) are earning a sizeable chunk of foreign exchange from agriculture.
Added to that, only 10 countries in the segment (Burundi, Congo Democratic Republic, Guinea Bissau, Laos, Myanmar, etc.) have agriculture contributing to more than 50 percent of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It is regrettable to note that in a majority of the agricultural economies, the annual growth rate of agriculture remains much below that of industry, manufacturing, and service sectors.
According to United Nations projections, the world population is expected to exceed 8.0 billion by 2025. On average, 73 million people will be added annually, and 97 percent of the projected growth will take place in the developing countries. Nearly 1.2 billion people live in a state of absolute poverty. About 800 million people are food insecure, and 160 million preschool children suffer from malnutrition. A large number of people also suffer from deficiencies of micronutrients such as iron and vitamin A. Food insecurity and malnutrition result in serious public health problems and lost human potential in developing countries. The major problems faced by the rural poor include low productivity, food insecurity, and poor nutrition.
The availability of land is decreasing over time, and such a decrease is expected to be much greater in the developing countries than in developed countries especially in Asia. Grain production has shown a remarkable increase between 1950 and 1980, while a marginal increase was recorded between 1980 and 1990. There is a need to increase production foods to meet the demands of increasing population.
The south Asian region is home to the largest number of poor people in the world. Nearly one-third of all malnourished people in the world live in this region and they need access to affordable and nutritious food. Food security is a critical concern in south Asia, especially against the current background of rapid population growth. The resource-poor, small-scale farmers, who contribute substantially to food production in this region, need to be empowered with appropriate technologies to enhance sustainable agricultural productivity and production.


RELATIONSHIP WITH POVERTY


Across the globe there is a nexus between agriculture and poverty in low-income countries. It is necessary to appreciate the paradox in this relationship. In many developing countries about 60 to 75 percent of the aggregate national labor force either works or depends on the output of land for sustenance.
This sharply contrasts with the situation in advanced countries, even though they usually have a flourishing agriculture. Thus, in the United States about 12 percent and in the United Kingdom about 5 percent of the workforce are engaged in agricultural pursuits. Even in countries like Canada and Australia, in which agriculture is one of the major sectors of the national economy, only about 25 percent of the workforce is engaged in agriculture. In India, as in China, a staggering 65 percent are engaged in or dependent on agriculture.
The World Bank has stated: “Absolute poverty blights the lives of millions in many (developing) countries. They have barely adequate (and often uncertain) diets, and incomes so low that they can spend little for clothing, fuel, shelter, and other essentials. Past experience clearly shows that a combination of the growth of agriculture and of the economy is essential for longterm alleviation of (such) poverty.


THIRD WORLD AGRICULTURE


When we look at the state of contemporary agriculture in most poor countries, we realize the enormity of the task that lies ahead. A brief comparison between agricultural productivity in the developed countries and the underdeveloped nations makes this clear. World agriculture, in fact, comprises two distinct types of farming:
1) the highly efficient agriculture of the developed countries, where substantial productive capacity and high output per worker permit a very small number of farmers to feed entire nation;
2) inefficient and low-productivity agriculture of developing countries, in many instances, which barely sustains the farm population let alone the burgeoning urban population, even at a minimum level of subsistence.
The gap between the two kinds of agriculture is immense. This is best illustrated by the disparities in labor For example, in least developed countries, the value added per agricultural worker in 1995 was $459 while in other countries like Norway, Sweden, and Japan it was $34,809, $28,590, and $16,712 respectively. 
Another manifestation of the productivity gap relates to land productivity. The table below, from the World Bank, shows variations in land productivity (measured as kilograms of grain harvested per hectare of agricultural land) between Japan and the United States on one hand, and six heavily populated countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America on the other. In the developed countries, there has been a steady growth of agriculture output since the mid-18th century.
This growth has been spurred by technological and biological improvements, which have resulted in ever higher levels of labor and land productivity. 
The growth rate accelerated after World War I and particularly after World War II. The end result is that fewer farmers are able to produce more food. This is especially the case in the United States, where in 1998 only two percent of the total workforce were agricultural, compared with more than 70 percent in the early 19th century.
For example in 1820, the American farmer could produce only four times his own consumption. A century later, in 1920, his productivity had doubled, and he could provide enough for eight persons. It took only another 32 years for this productivity to double again, and then only 12 more years for it to double once more. By 1987, a single American farmer could provide enough food to feed almost 80 people. Moreover, during the entire period, average farm incomes in North America rose steadily. The picture is entirely different when we turn to the agricultural production experience of developing nations.
In many poor countries, agricultural production methods have changed relatively slowly over time Much of this technological stagnation can be traced to the special circumstances of peasant agriculture, with its high risks and uncertain rewards. Rapid rural population growth has compounded the problem by causing great pressure to be exerted on existing resources.
Where fertile land is scarce, especially throughout south and southeast Asia, but also in many parts of Latin America and Africa, rapid population growth has led to an increase in the number of people living on each unit of land. Given the same farming technology and the use of traditional nonlabor inputs (simple tools, animal power, traditional seeds), we know from the principle of diminishing returns that as more and more people are forced to work on a given piece of land, their marginal (and average) productivity will decline. The net result is a continuous deterioration in real living standards for rural peasants.
To avert massive starvation and raise levels of living for the average rural dweller, agricultural production and the productivity of both labor and land must be rapidly increased throughout Asia, Africa, and Latin America. 
Most developing nations need to become more self-sufficient in their food production; others can rely on their successful nonagricultural exports to secure the necessary foreign exchange to import their food requirements. But for the majority of debt-ridden, inefficient, and unsuccessful exporters, unless major economic, institutional, and structural changes are made in farming systems, their food dependence, especially on North American supplies, will increase in the coming years.
In many developed countries, various historical circumstances have led to a concentration of large areas of land in the hands of a small class of powerful landowners.
This is especially true in Latin America and parts of the Asian subcontinent. In Africa, both historical circumstances and availability of relatively more unused land have resulted in a different pattern and structure of agricultural activity; however, in terms of levels of farm productivity, there is little to distinguish among the three regions.
A common characteristic of agriculture in all three regions, and for that matter in many developed countries, is the position of the family farm as the basic unit of production. As Raanan Weitz points out: “For the vast number of farm families, whose members constitute the main agricultural work force, agriculture is not merely an occupation or a source of income; it is a way of life. This is particularly evident in traditional societies, where farmers are closely attached to their land and devote long, arduous days to its cultivation. Any change in farming methods brings with it changes in the farmer’s way of life. The introduction of biological and technical innovations must therefore be adapted not only to the natural and economic conditions, but perhaps even more to the attitudes, values, and abilities of the mass of producers, who must understand the suggested changes, must be willing to accept them, and must be capable of carrying them out.”
Thus in spite of the obvious differences among agricultural systems in Asia, Latin America, and Africa and among individual nations within each region, certain similarities enable us to make some generalizations and comparisons. In particular, agrarian systems in many parts of Asia and Latin America show more structural and institutional similarities than differences, and subsistence farmers in all three regions exhibit many of the same economic behavior patterns.


GROWTH OF AGRICULTURAL POVERTY


Land, the dominant factor in agricultural production, is no longer an importance source of livelihood. Farm size is very small and has been declining under continued population pressure. Up to 50 percent of rural households are “functionally landless.” The average size of a holding is less than one hectare in many countries.
The small and poor farmers, however, were able to increase land productivity and farm income by adopting high-yielding modern varieties of rice and wheat, the dominant food staples, supported by public-sector investment for irrigation, flood control, and drainage.
The shift of land from traditional to modern varieties contributes to an increase in income of $100 to $150 per hectare, which is less than 10 percent of annual rural household income. The technological progress has helped reduce the unit cost of food production, enabling farmers to market the surplus food to consumers at affordable prices without taking a cut in profits. The sectoral decline in the real price of staple foods was the main factor behind the moderate progress in poverty alleviation.
Fertile land is becoming scarcer due to demographic and economic growth and resource depletion, including climate change. Greater competition for land resources, increased mobility, and the incorporation of rural areas into market economies through diversification and/or specialization are placing increasing pressure on governments to introduce policies that give the poor secure access to land.
Agricultural growth and poverty reduction depend significantly on increasing agricultural productivity; this will be particularly true for future progress in Sub-Saharan Africa. 
There is widespread evidence that, whether a tenure system is communal or individual, freehold or leasehold, farmers are more likely to invest in their land and achieve productivity gains, when they have secure land rights.
An important component of tenure security in market economies is the confidence with which rights transactions can be made. Governments should be encouraged to underwrite security of land tenure (a widely recognized public good) by providing the legal and institutional capacity needed for just, equitable and efficient land administration and, where necessary, intervening in the land market to make reforms related to land distribution.
Although developing-country government land departments are aware of the need for land reform and for efficient and equitable land administration, their performance is notoriously poor. They face various problems, including:
1) weak legal and institutional frameworks;
2) over-centralized and inaccessible land registries;
3) corruption and arbitrary land acquisition and eviction;
4) inadequate arrangements for land dispute resolution;
5) the demise of customary systems of common property resource management;
6) unsustainable systems of land use; and
7) political conflict, civil war and humanitarian disasters (in extreme cases).
Politicians and officials continue to use their discretionary power and influence over land allocation and revocation for political and personal advantage. Landowners and land professionals often have vested interests in perpetuating the status quo.
Consequently they impede the adoption of more simple, accessible, and efficient systems for land transfer, land survey, and the registration and collection of land information, which would facilitate the development of land markets and the levying of land taxes in rural areas.
Land reform entails redistribution of land, remodeling of land rights, and improvement of land administration in a manner that fits the requirements of the political system promoting the reform. For the purpose of this article, it is helpful to subdivide land reform initiatives into actions involving direct land redistribution for productive use, land policy reforms that strengthen tenure security, and actions that improve the efficiency of the land market.
Redistributive land reform, which can include the restitution of land to the dispossessed, is generally taken to mean the redistribution of property rights in land for the benefit of the landless, poor tenants and farm laborers. Invariably, the motivation for redistributive land reform is political and coincides with a shift in the balance of power between conservative and more radical forces. Throughout history, opportunities for redistributive reform have been associated with specific political moments; for example, at the end of World War II in southeast Asia, following the overthrow of President Ferdinand Marcos in 1986 in the Philippines, after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, and with the transition to majority rule in South Africa in 1994. In all these situations new constitutions were adopted with amended principles concerning land and property.
The political stimulus for land redistribution affects the extent to which agricultural systems are transformed, the degree of productivity increase, and the extent of economic growth that will benefit the poor.
There are a number of possible scenarios, but we can learn most about agriculture and poverty reduction when land redistribution has enabled or coincided with increases in farm output and productivity from which the poor have benefited, and when land redistribution has not resulted in increases in farm output and productivity and/or has not been beneficial for the poor. A third interesting scenario exists when redistribution has indirectly contributed to agriculture and production, for example, when agrarian conflict has been avoided.
Ownership of land within many large estates in south and southeast Asia has been transferred to tenants during the past 60 years and the new systems have all proven to be successful. Redistribution has been limited largely to the transfer of land rights to sharecropping tenants and did not necessarily involve the breakup of operational holdings.
Reforms have contributed to increases in farm output and productivity and to political stability. In China, land reform under Chairman Mao Zedong took place initially as a result of peasant mobilization against landlords.
This occurred in 1949 and 1950 when landless laborers and peasants subdivided large landholdings and organized cooperatives. Communes were then established, but during the 1970s, households were assigned individual responsibility for crops and livestock and were allowed to dispose of farm products in excess of the fixed quotas that had to be sold to state marketing organizations.
In 1988 the constitution was amended to legalize land use rights and land transfers. The reforms have generated farm and nonfarm rural employment and eliminated the rural landlessness of the prerevolutionary era that still afflicts much of Asia, Africa, and Latin America today. The reforms have encouraged urbanization, since peasants leaving the countryside are able to rent out or cash in their property assets.
In Africa repossession of land occupied by colonial settlers was a central issue in the latter half of the 20th century. Under the so-called one million acre scheme in Kenya, more than 1,000 white-owned farms were transferred to Africans between 1962 and 1966, with Britain underwriting the land values paid in compensation.
Originally the plan was to transfer private (freehold) land to three categories of African farmers: large-scale commercial farmers, small-scale commercial farmers, and subsistence smallholders.
However, the demand for small-scale commercial farms was fewer than expected, which led to resettlement of many more smallholders than had been planned. During the 1970s, small-scale African producers greatly expanded their dairy and cash crop production.
This took place on redistributed farmland in the former “White Highlands” to the north of Nairobi, and on private and customary (traditional) land in the former African reserves. 
The expansion was a result more of the waiving of restrictions and the opening up of markets for small-scale producers than of land redistribution per se. However, productivity by small-scale African farmers on newly acquired high-potential land exceeded that of their European predecessors (and neighboring commercial farmers) in terms of returns to land and to scarce foreign exchange. Interestingly beneficiaries in the large-scale commercial category were less successful. 
The new owners were expected to acquire the land with government loans, but many defaulted. By the 1980s, the largely absentee large-scale commercial farmers had become a new class of landlords. Unable to farm their newly acquired property, they had rented out their land to landless peasants rather than subject it to invasion by squatters. 
Although the government-run program came to an end after 10 years, most of the 10 million hectares of land formerly owned by white settlers has now been transferred to Africans through the land market, the operation of which has been partly fuelled by political patronage.
Between 1980 and 1989, 3.3 million hectares were redistributed to 54,000 families. An evaluation of the program in 1988 found that it had made impressive strides toward achieving its principal objectives. 
The evaluation stated that the orderly settlement of so many families in such a relatively short time was a major accomplishment for the new regime. The majority of families resettled benefited from increased opportunities for income generation and from the availability of health and education facilities. These findings were partly confirmed by the results of long-term research some 15 years later.
There are several lessons that may be particularly pertinent in efforts to reduce poverty through agricultural growth. It is important to place the evidence in its geographical and historical context. Care is needed in drawing conclusions for one country (or region) on the basis of experience from another. Land policies have to be sensitive to local historical, cultural, and agro-ecological circumstances. Thus, of all redistributive land reforms, those in east Asia (Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan) are regarded as the most successful in terms of their comprehensive nature, their creation of a class of independent property-owning peasants, and their impact on poverty and landlessness. However, these changes were wrought in exceptional circumstances and opportunities for their application are limited.
A cyclical element is often evident in redistributive reform policy. An initially strong political commitment to land redistribution is often followed by caution as the opportunity costs and organizational complexities become apparent. Modification of the initial policy and a switch of emphasis to so-called economic goals, rather than the eradication of landlessness and poverty, may accompany this phase. Governments may then again reaffirm the needs of the landless, but in more modest terms than in the initial phase. However, in many unequal societies, extreme poverty and the threat of rural violence are endemic.
It is important to be clear whether land redistribution is about equity and social justice (especially redressing past dispossession) or whether it is aboutdriving agricultural production. These twin goals are not automatically complementary. South Africa is an important contemporary case.
The cost of inaction can be very high. If the legitimate claims of the rural poor are ignored, the negative consequences of failing to act can be huge. 
Social mobilization for land reform can be fuelled and sustained by a deep sense of grievance. Initially, moderate means will be used to present the demands for land reform, but if people meet with intransigence, their demands are likely to become more radical, and farm killings and land invasions may occur.
For land reform to have a significant impact on poverty reduction it must be part of a broader process of political, social, and economic change, rather than a narrow intervention simply to redistribute land. Greater democratization is often closely linked to the reform of land rights.
Agro-industrialization of the food processing industry will bring immense benefits to the economy, raising agricultural yields, meeting productivity, creating employment, and raising the standard of a very large number of people throughout the country, especially in the rural areas. 
Economic liberalization and rising consumer prosperity are opening up new opportunities for diversification in the food processing sector. Many economists believe liberalization of world trade will open up new vistas for growth.
India, a developing country, wastes more fruits and vegetables than the United Kingdom’s annual consumption.
Also in India, more food grains are wasted than what Australia produces annually, due to lack of postharvest facilities and food processing industries.
The drawbacks of agro-industrialization in developing nations are low-quality raw materials, which are not suitable for processing; post-harvest losses due to lack of proper storage and transport facilities; low linkage between farmer and industry; a shortage of technical manpower in food processing and packaging; poor agronomic practices and farm management, thereby creating poor raw materials for processing; high cost of processing, distribution, and promotion and inadequate market information; and most of the fruits are of table variety and as such are costly and not suitable for processing.
Demand for highly processed convenience food is constantly on the rise. Only two to three percent of India’s agri-produce is processed as compared to 65 percent in the United States and 50 percent in Brazil. Based on the huge gap between the demand and supply in international markets and untapped domestic markets, availability of cheap labor, raw materials, and favorable government policy are all encouraging investment in the food-processing sector in many Asian countries like India and China.
With the proliferation of the highly capital-intensive information technology (IT) industry, unemployment levels are bound to shoot up, compounded by expansion of higher education facilities and falling death rates. Against this backdrop, experts say governments should take corrective action to contain the alarmingly high growth in unemployment in  developing small agro-based industries (food processing). 
Owing to food processing’s relatively low investment, high laborintensive nature, and short gestation periods, it may be the only means of effective utilization of the rich human resource base in India, causing uplifting of the rural poor from below the poverty line and achievement of self-sufficiency.
About 65 percent of the people in developing countries are living in rural areas; many of them are still dependent on agriculture for their livelihood. Unless the rural economy is improved, the burden of poverty cannot be lessened nor can the working population overflowing from the villages be curtailed. The complementarity between agriculture and industry enables the economy to use the by-products of agriculture and improve the technological base of agriculture, brining about a transformation in the rural economy.
In addition to the development of agriculture, emphasis may be laid on rural industrial and subsidiary activities for a rapid transformation of the rural economy.
The advantages may be multifold: establishing linkage between agriculture and industry, increasing employment opportunities, improving economic well-being, and preventing migration of rural population to cities and thereby reducing the pressure on urban land. 
Many social and economic problems will be warded off when rural development takes place through this possible means of setting up agro-based small industries.
If agriculture is to be more effective in poverty reduction, farm and nonfarm linkages need to be strengthened and fostered. As far as the Bangladesh experience is concerned, the rural nonfarm economy has grown at a faster rate (about seven percent annually) than the growth in agriculture (about four percent).
These have developed as backward and forward linkages of Green Revolution technologies and are characterized as rural construction and manufacturing, rural trade and other services, and rural transports.
The local-level manufacturing of irrigation equipment, growth of metal workshops and repair services, development of house-building materials, carpentry and masonry, and grain trading are the examples of dynamic segments of rural nonfarm activities.


GREEN REVOLUTION


Science and technology underpinned the economic and social gains in Asia over the past 30 years. In agriculture, these gains came to be known as the Green Revolution.
Between 1970 and 1995, cereal production in Asia doubled, calorie availability per person increased by 24 percent, and real food prices halved. Although the region’s population grew by 1 billion people, overall food production more than kept pace with population growth.
These food production increases were achieved largely by the cultivation of high-yielding varieties (HYVs) of rice and wheat, accompanied by expansion of irrigated areas, increases in fertilizer and pesticide use, and greater availability of credit.
The scientific basis for the Green Revolution stemmed from national and international research programs that led to the development and distribution of new HYVs, particularly of rice and wheat. 
The first generation of these new varieties was based on the introduction of new genes for dwarfing that made the HYVs shorter, more responsive to fertilizers, and less prone to falling over or lodging when fertilized and irrigated.
Subsequent varieties also carried genes that gave increased pest and disease resistance and improved taste and grain quality.
Despite these successes, problems remain. The intensification of agriculture and the reliance on irrigation and chemical inputs have led to environmental degradation, increased salinity, and pesticide misuse.
Deforestation, overgrazing, and overfishing also threaten the sustainable use of natural resources. Green Revolution technologies had little impact on the millions of smallholders living in rain-fed and marginal areas, where poverty is concentrated.
Furthermore the Green Revolution has already run its course in much of Asia. Wheat and rice yields in the major growing areas of Asia have been stagnant or declining for the past decade, while population continues to increase. 
The key lessons learned from the Green Revolution are that it has benefited farmers in irrigated areas much more than farmers in rain-fed areas, thus worsening the income disparity between the two groups; it overlooked the rights of women to also benefit from the technological advances; and it promoted an excessive use of pesticides that are harmful to the environment.
As countries became self-sufficient in food, government investments declined in the agricultural sector and in science and technology across the region. This reflects a worldwide trend toward declining public investinvestments in the rural sector and in agricultural research and development (R&D), nationally and internationally.
In Asia, private-sector investments in the rural sector and related R&D have concentrated on export commodities.
The downward trends in public investments by governments and development agencies in smallholder agriculture over the past decade have not been matched by a concomitant rise in private investments.
Similarly, there is little (and few incentives for) private R&D on the food crops, livestock, fisheries, and aquaculture systems important for food security and poverty reduction in rural Asia.
The population of Asia is projected to increase from 3 billion to 4.5 billion in the next 25 years. 
During the same period, the urban population will nearly double from 1.2 billion to 2 billion, as rural people move to the cities in search of employment. These increases will place massive pressure on developing countries to increase food production. Food demands will be influenced by population growth, urbanization, income, and associated changes in dietary preferences.
Urbanization and income growth frequently lead to shifts from a diet based on root crops (cassava, yam, and sweet potato), sorghum, millets, and maize to rice and wheat, which require less preparation time, and to more meat, milk, fruits, vegetables, and processed foods. This dietary transition has already happened in much of the region. Meeting the food needs of Asia’s growing and increasingly urbanized population requires increases in agricultural productivity and matching these increases to dietary changes and rising incomes.
To meet this demand, cereal production will need to be increased by at least 40 percent from the present level of about 650 million tons annually, most of which will have to come from yield increases.
In addition, meat demand will double during the period. Production increases will have to be achieved by increasing yields in a sustainable way to conserve diminishing and degraded natural resources. Nearly all of these production increases will need to take place in developing countries because on average 90 percent of the world’s food is consumed in the country where it is produced.
Food imports are not only expensive but discourage the creation of employment, which is badly needed in the rural areas. In this new millennium, we face a food, feed, and fiber production challenge in highly complex farming systems for several reasons:
1) Water will become the most important limiting factor in agricultural production because the quality and quantity of water will decline as a result of pollution, forest degradation, and increased agricultural, domestic, and industrial use.
2) Urbanization will mean the loss of agricultural land to residential and industrial development, and a decline in the number of farmworkers.
3) Most farmers are poor with small landholdings.
4) Farming systems are commonly heterogeneous with mixes of food crops, livestock, and trees.
5) About 70 percent of the cultivated land is rain-fed with unreliable distribution and intensity of rainfall.
Thus, the increase in food production during the next 25 years will have to be achieved using less labor, water, and cultivated land. This can be done only if scientists can develop new crop varieties with high-yield potential and high-water-use efficiency. 
New understanding of plant and animal genes may offer ways to increase crop yields to the levels required to adequately and sustainably feed the growing population in Asia. Thus, developments in modern biotechnology could make extremely important contributions to future agricultural growth, food security, and poverty reduction.
Increasing smallholder agriculture productivity will increase food supplies, and will reduce poverty and malnutrition, increase food access, and improve living standards of the poor.


POVERTY REDUCTION


While the need for further intensification of agricultural production in Asia and several developing countries in Latin America is clear, intensification strategies must change to avoid adverse environmental impact and to reverse the effects of earlier practices. Enhanced but inefficient use of irrigation and mineral fertilizers over the past three decades has had negative side effects such as soil salinity and nutrient leaching.
With crop intensification, incidences of pests and diseases also increased.
According to agricultural experts, the following strategies are needed to meet the food demand in developing countries over the next 25 years: sustainable productivity increases in food, feed, and fiber crops; reducing chemical inputs of fertilizers and pesticides and replacing these with biologically based products; integrating soil, water, and nutrient management; improving the nutrition and productivity of livestock and controlling livestock diseases; sustainable increases in livestock, fisheries, and aquaculture production; and increasing trade and competitiveness in globalized markets.
As rural poverty persists in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, agriculture will play a prominent role in achieving equitable and sustainable rural growth in the 21st century. Even when rural people do not work directly in agriculture, they rely on nonfarm employment and income closely related to agriculture. Where there are large numbers of rural poor, agricultural growth is a catalyst for broad-based economic growth and development.
Agriculture’s linkages to the nonfarm economy generate employment, income, and growth in the rest of the economy.
The poverty reduction strategy sees three factors— pro-poor, sustainable economic growth; good governance; and social development—as key elements for reducing poverty. Biotechnology may contribute toward achieving the poverty reduction goals in several components of the strategy: increasing priority for agriculture and rural development, addressing environmental considerations; increasing the public- and private-sector roles in poverty reduction, encouraging regional and subregional cooperation, and coordinating efforts of funding agencies.
Based on the available trends, one can only infer that the Third World countries are not paying the necessary attention to agriculture. The share of agriculture in their GDP, diminishing growth rate in agriculture, and decrease of agriculture’s share in foreign exchange stand as testimony to this.
The availability of vast cultivable land, rich natural resources, and a productive labor force will all help the development of agriculture if the developing nations properly utilize developments in agriculture like organic farming and the use of genetically modified seeds for producing globally competitive products. Embarking on the path of scientific farming and organic cultivation backed by sound human resources management practices will see the Third World occupy pride of place in the immense potential of developed world markets.

By P. Seinivas Subbarao, Ph .D. Andhra University, India.
In: 'Encyclopedia of World Poverty'  3 v. General Editor Mehmet Odekon- Skidmore College, Sage Publication, Thousand Oaks USA, 2006, V. 1  p. 17-26, Adapted/edited  by Leopoldo Costa.