Agriculture, Food Security and Rural Development

Abstract

Globally, nearly 70 per cent of people living in extreme poverty live in rural areas (European Commission 2000a, p. 5). If the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving poverty by 2015 is to be achieved, then special attention needs to be devoted to rural economies, and specifically to agricultural policies. While the majority of the poor in the Caribbean¹ and Pacific² ACP countries also live in rural areas, the severity of the problem is most pronounced in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). In global terms, poverty is on the decline, with the number of people living in absolute poverty being set to fall from 1.27 billion in 1990 to 0.75 billion by 2015 (Broca et al. 2003, p. 216). However, these global averages belie regional imbalances. East Asia and South Asia have made significant progress over and above their 1990 MDG baseline figures and appear set to continue in this vein. The situation in Africa, on the other hand, is set to worsen. Since 1990, levels of poverty in SSA have increased and, it has been argued, are likely to increase even beyond 2015. If these projections are correct, then by 2015 nearly half of all those living in absolute poverty will be resident in Africa (Broca et al. 2003, p. 216).