Agricultural and Rural Development Notes
59 items available
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This series on commodity risk management aims to disseminate the results of World Bank research that describes the feasibility of developing countries’ ability to utilize market-based tools to mitigate risks associated with commodity price volatility and weather.
Items in this collection
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Publication
Improving Nutrition through Multisectoral Approaches
(Washington, DC, 2013-01)Nutrition sensitive agriculture aims to maximize the impact of nutrition outcomes for the poor, while minimizing the unintended negative nutritional consequences of agricultural interventions and policies on the poor, especially women and young children. It is agriculture with a nutrition lens, and should not detract from the sector's own goals. The agriculture sector is best placed to influence food production and the consumption of nutritious foods necessary for healthy and active lives. Agricultural productivity, focused primarily on staple grains, does not necessarily reduce under nutrition. Policies that strongly favor staple grains over other crops or foods may skew the balance from nutritious foods. -
Publication
Lessons from Scaling Up: Reducing Postharvest Loss through Mini Cold Storage Technology - Lessons from India
(Washington, DC, 2012-06)The new 'lessons from practice: assessing scalability' report aims to provide specific tools and guidance to World Bank Task Team Leaders (TTLs) and other agricultural development specialists which can assist them in identifying the potential for scaling up small, innovative projects throughout the entire project cycle, from inception through completion. The report, developed in collaboration with the Heller school for social policy and management at Brandeis University, draws on lessons from the experience of the Development Marketplace (DM) in funding small innovation projects and offers strategic advice to agricultural practitioners on assessing the scalability of such projects. This note is based on a case study from India from the report. -
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Gender and Governance in Agricultural Extension Services : Insights from India, Ghana, and Ethiopia
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2010-03)The gender and governance in rural services insights from India, Ghana, and Ethiopia report aims to generate policy-relevant knowledge on strategies for improving agricultural service delivery, with a focus on providing more equitable access to these services, especially for women. The project has been implemented in India, Ghana, and Ethiopia. These countries were chosen to capture variation in important macro-factors, especially the level of economic development; various aspects of governance, such as political system and party system; the role of women in society; and strategies adopted to promote gender equity. The project focused on agricultural extension as an example of a critical agricultural service. In India, the main problem is the lack of overall capacity resulting from a past policy of not hiring agricultural extension providers. The study indicates that access to agricultural extension is low in Ghana, despite the fact that an extension agent-to-farmer ratio is comparatively high. Agricultural extension is a high for the Ethiopia government priority, but coverage of extension services across regions varies widely, and extension agents have limited discretion to adapt technology packages to the context of individual communities. The gender gap in access to extension can also be improved. -
Publication
Empowerment and Poverty Reduction through Infrastructure and Service Provision in Rural Pakistan
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2010-01)Poverty in Pakistan is overwhelmingly rural. Some two-thirds of Pakistan's population, and over 60 percent of the country's poor, live in rural areas. In 2005, average per capita expenditures in rural areas were 31 percent lower than in urban areas. This inequality between urban and rural areas is re-enforced by inequality within and between rural areas. Owing to uneven access to land and useable water, most of the increased income that results from agricultural production accrues to higher income farmers-who typically spend a disproportionate amount of their income on urban goods and services. This inequality seriously limits the impacts of agricultural growth on rural poverty, and is a major cause of sustained poverty and low productivity among small farmers and rural nonfarm households. It also points to the importance of effectively targeting the poor in contexts in which resources intended for them are likely to be captured by more privileged groups. -
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Tracking Results in Agriculture and Rural Development in Less-Than-Ideal Conditions : A Sourcebook of Indicators for Monitoring and Evaluation
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2009-03)The demand for verifiable evidence of results and impacts of development agricultural programs and projects is growing. However, most of the indicators that development practitioners have traditionally used in tracking progress toward achieving projects' objectives focus on the workings of the development operation itself. These performance indicators relate mainly to lower-level inputs and outputs and are used to populate management information systems. Higher-level indicators are used to measure progress in achieving the ultimate objectives of projects, and in bringing about larger outcomes and impacts. The ability to measure and demonstrate outcomes and impacts relies on the use of indicators that are based on reliable data and on the capacity to systematically collect and analyze that information. The conditions in which monitoring and evaluation (M&E) are carried out vary widely, depending on the demand for information, the extent to which it is used to inform decision-making, and the reliability of the systems that are in place to capture and convey that information. Throughout much of the developing world these conditions are "less-than-ideal," and information is irregular and often lacking altogether. In these conditions there is a lack of effective demand for information on the part of policy makers. The conditions are often especially pronounced for data related to rural areas, where the costs of data collection are high and the quality of existing data is particularly low. Building data systems and developing and supporting capacity for M&E in these conditions is, therefore, a pressing imperative for interventions in the agriculture and rural development sector. Strengthening capacity for M&E begins at the national and sub-national levels, where addressing the weaknesses of national statistical systems is a common priority. The data collected and reported within countries must not only be of sufficient quality to inform planning and policy formulation but must also be consistent between countries. -
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Financial Services for Developing Small-Scale Irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2008-09)Food insecurity and income poverty are rampant in Sub-Saharan Africa. Thirty-one percent of children under the age of five are malnourished and some 72 percent of the population lives on less than US$2 day. Forty-one percent lives on less than US$1 day. The impoverished and hungry are concentrated disproportionately in rural areas and rely mainly on the consumption and sale of agricultural produce for their food and income. Africa has experienced increasing dependency on food imports that its countries cannot afford. Yet an estimated 700,000 hectares of arable land in Africa remains uncultivated. It is land that could become productive through small-scale irrigation using basic technology to draw on small-water resources, such as tube wells, and dambos. The technologies can be applied to cultivate smallholder plots of up to five hectares. Employing them will enable up to 4 million low-income households to intensify agricultural production and increase productivity. Small-scale irrigation can increase agricultural productivity and production, thus contributing to economic growth in rural areas and increased well-being among small holder farmers. Its potential to increase and stabilize food supply is especially important in light of the ongoing food crisis, and especially in Africa. Expanding the use of small-scale irrigation requires farmers to have access to financial services. The many constraints and obstacles that rural financial institutions in Africa confront must be purposefully navigated if financial services are to fulfill this role. Effectively tailoring financial services and products to support irrigation in different settings and among different client groups will be essential to success. Carefully targeting grant funding to the very poorest subsistence farmers and clearly separating it from lending will be likewise be critical to the sustainability of these financial services. -
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From Agriculture to Nutrition : Pathways, Synergies and Outcomes
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2008-07)This note discusses the direct pathways through which agricultural production can contribute to improved nutrition. It then reviews recent changes in the global environment which affect the ways in which agriculture and nutrition are linked. It concludes with a discussion of how nutrition-related objectives can be effectively incorporated into the design of agriculture programs for maximum impact on the poor. -
Publication
Assessing the Investment Climate for Rural Enterprises
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2008-05)The 2008 World Development Report identifies competition as an important variable of the rural investment climate. Competition triggers innovation and the productivity gains that drive economic growth, and with it the creation of jobs. Employment is generally the principal pathway that people have out of poverty. Fostering such competitive environments entails inducing the entry of local, mainly small-and-medium enterprises as well as the development of agribusinesses that enable small farmers, entrepreneurs, and investors to participate in expanding markets. The barriers to entry confronting prospective small rural enterprises include all the risks and costs and market failures characteristic of many rural economies, in addition to poor access to financial and public services, weak business skills, and extremely limited or non-existent information about what demand consists of in the non-local markets they hope to sell to. Improving the opportunities and incentives for rural firms to invest productively, expand, and bring on new workers should be a policy priority for governments, particularly given the prominence of policy, regulations, and enforcement in rural investors' perception of risk. Providing a sound, enabling policy environment is a vital role of the government and public sector and includes setting food quality and safety grades and standards and reliable contract enforcement. Such stable policy environments go very far in relieving investors' uncertainty over what governments will do next, what policies will be formulated, and how policies and regulations will be interpreted and enforced. This is a pressing concern among investors. Making policy formulation and enforcement more predictable can dramatically encourage investment (World Bank 2005). -
Publication
Brazil Land - Brazil Land-Based Poverty Alleviation Project
( 2008-02)The Land-Based Poverty Alleviation Project of Brazil is addressing one of the major factors underlying poverty in the countryside: inadequate access to land by the rural poor. Preceded by two highly successful Bank-financed pilots, the project demonstrates the large-scale viability of a community-based approach to land reform. In the project beneficiary groups negotiate directly with willing sellers for the purchase of suitable properties. They obtain financing for the purchase of the land, support for complementary subproject, and technical assistance to establish themselves on or near the land and to improve the productivity of the acquired properties. The project is implemented by civil society through community associations. Participation is also open to local, state, and national civil society organizations, and to governmental organizations, including the National Confederation of Agricultural Workers (CONTAG). Associations of poor rural laborers and subsistence farmers select, negotiate, and obtain financing to purchase agricultural properties from willing sellers. Project implementation by community associations has been successful overall. The design of the project places beneficiaries in the driver's seat, and the success of community associations in mobilizing members, selecting land for purchase, designing a productive subproject, and implementing it has been impressive. -
Publication
Land-Related Legal Aid in Community Driven Development Projects : Lessons from Andhra Pradesh
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2008-02)This note reviews the role legal aid can play as a catalyst to empower and strengthen the livelihoods of the poor in a World Bank-funded project in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh (AP), the AP Rural Poverty Reduction Project. This note shows how land-related legal aid activities can be implemented to support community-driven development project objectives. Initial evidence on the positive impacts of legal aid on economic and social advancement of the project's target population in AP suggests that attention to the land rights of the poor can significantly enhance the impact of community-driven development projects in India. The note discusses how projects being implemented in other states might benefit from adoption of a land-related legal aid component.