Rodney Cooke

1. Session P 3.1 Innovations for Better Livelihoods
30 October 2012
Chair: Rodney D. Cooke
Facilitator: Patrick Dugan

2. GCARD Roadmap identifies 6 key areas:
• Collective focus on key priorities as determined & shaped by science and
society
• True and effective partnership between research and those it serves
• Increasing investments to meet the huge challenges ahead
• Enhancing capacities to generate, share and use agricultural knowledge for
development
• Effective linkages that embed research in wider development processes and
commitments
• Better demonstration of impacts and returns from agricultural innovation

3. GCARD 2
• Foresight for impact - matching research priorities to future
development needs
• Partnerships for impact
This theme concerns the roles and actions needed by all partners along
intended agricultural innovation pathways – as projected for the CGIAR CRPs
and other national, regional and international partnership actions
• Capacity development for impact

4. Aim of the GCARD 2 Parallel Sessions
• describe the outcomes expected with the programs reviewed;
• identify key gaps which need to be addressed through new partnerships;
• indicate what would be required to achieve large scale impacts
The focus of all sessions is on the practical actions to which interested
parties are prepared to commit, and the Outcomes that can be achieved
over the next two years and reported back in 2014
GCARD is intended as a process bringing to a head key issues identified by
GFAR stakeholders as advances and or limitations to AR4D.

6. The state of rural poverty today
• Developing world remains more Rural population trends
rural than urban: 55% of 1600
Millions of people
population is rural – 3.1 billion 1400
1200
people 1000
800
• Around 2020-2025 two major 600
changes expected: 400
200
oThe total rural population will 0
1950
1955
1960
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
2015
2020
2025
2030
2035
2040
2045
2050
peak, and then start to Seri es 11 Rura l Sub-Sa ha ra n Afri ca
decline Rura l South a nd Centra l As i a
Rura l Mi ddl e Ea s t a nd North Afri ca
Rura l La ti n Ameri ca a nd the Ca ri bbea n
Rura l Ea s t a nd South Ea s t As i a
Seri es 17 Pea k Rura l Popul a ti on SSA
oThe total urban population Pea k Rura l Popul a ti on SCA Pea k Rura l Popul a ti on LAC
Pea k Rura l Popul a ti on ESEA Pea k Rura l Popul a ti on MENA
will overtake rural population

7. The state of rural poverty today
Rural share of total poverty Rural share of total poverty
(Rural people as percentage of those living on less than
Of 1.4 billion people living on US$ 1.25 /day)
<$1.25 a day, 70% – 1.0 billion Eastern Asia
people – live in rural areas 100
South Asia
90
South Eastern
• So despite urbanization, in much 80
Asia
70
of the developing world, poverty 60
Sub-Saharan
Africa
remains largely rural – 50 Latin America
particularly in Asia and SSA 40
Middle East and
30 North Africa
20 Developing
World
Closest 1988 Closest 1998 Closest 2008

8. Smallholders are key
500 million smallholder farms
worldwide supporting around 2
billion people. They:
Farm 80% of the farmland in Asia
and Africa.
Produce 80% of the food
consumed in the developing world
Feed 1/3 of the global population.
Women are increasingly the
farmers of the developing world,

9. Relevance of addressing gender in ARD: Yields gap between men- and women-
run farms of 20-30%
Role of rural women Challenges facing rural women
•Account for 43% of agricultural •Limited access to inputs, services
labour force in developing and rural infrastructure
countries; 50% in Eastern Asia and (technology, education, extension,
SSA health, finance, markets, water,
•Typically work 16 hours per day energy)
•Multi-tasking with mix of •Represent fewer than 5% of all
productive and household agricultural land holders in NENA;
responsibilities SSA average of 15%
•Limited contribution to decision-
making in home, organizations and
community

10. Farmers do agriculture: people–focus - and women are usually the farmers
• 500 million smallholder farms worldwide
The challenge:
to transform smallholder agriculture into successful
agribusinesses

11. Sustainable agricultural intensification
• Growing and wide interest in agric. approaches that are more sustainable and resilient as well as
productive (e.g. IAASTD 2008).
• SAI focuses on: improved soil / water management; harnessing of agro-ecological processes for
enhancing soil fertility; selective/frugal use of external inputs; human capital for adapting/
innovating, and social capital to resolve landscape-scale problems
• Includes practices such as: conservation agric. ; water and soil conservation techniques; micro-
irrigation, rainwater management, drainage; integrated pest management (IPM); integrated plant
nutrient management; crop rotation; integrated crop and livestock/fish systems; agro-forestry
• None of the SAI practices represent an alternative to conventional approaches to intensification;
rather, intended to be complementary
• SAI means different things in different places: a systemic approach, context adaptation, and linking
farmers’ own and scientific knowledge. Premium on knowledge and innovation makes it well-suited
for young farmers

12. Sustainable agricultural intensification
• How to move the SAI agenda forward? Six elements of a policy and institutional framework:
1. Land tenure: security of tenure; easing up of land rental markets
2. Pricing, incentives and regulation: consistent with policy direction; environmental regulation;
food product and process standards
3. Payment for environmental services: importance of soil carbon market for smallholder agric., to
provide incentive to adopt SAI practices
4. Agricultural education: to develop capacity for SAI, need for improved agric. education and
training for farmers and agric. specialists
5. Agricultural research: need for increased research expenditure / focus on SAI agenda, multi-
stakeholder innovation, client orientation – TAR4D
6. Agricultural advisory services: need for joint-problem solving and farmer capacitation – key
challenge one of upscaling

13. The advent (almost) of agriculture in the climate change debates – CC
CoPs and Rio: 4 key messages
• Food security, poverty reduction and climate change are closely linked
– must not be considered separately
• Without strong CC adaptation measures, poverty and food security
goals will not be met
• Adaptation enhances FS and can reduce GHGs from agriculture
• Climate smart agriculture offers triple wins for FS, adaptation and
mitigation

14. Creating opportunities in the non-farm rural economy
•The RNFE is important for risk The share of non-agricultural income in total rural income, by
management and for escaping country per capita GDP
poverty. Large number of rural 80
people, rich and poor, are involved Indonesia '00
Bulgaria '01
in it. 60
Bangladesh '00
Pakistan '01 Albania '05 Panama '03
Guatemala '00
•As economies grow, so the RNFE Nepal '96
Ecuador '98
Nicaragua '01
40
Ghana '98
expands; its importance is growing Malawi '04
Viet Nam '98
Madagascar '93
•In some countries in Asia and L. 20
Nigeria '04
America, non-farm income sources
0
already make up a higher % of rural 0 2000 4000 6000 8000
incomes than agriculture GDP per capita (US$ PPP, constant 2000)

15. RPR - What needs to be done ?
Attention and investment needed around four cross-cutting issues:
• Investing in the rural areas – making them a better place to live and do business
(infrastructure, services, governance)
• Making the rural environment less risky, and helping poor rural people to better manage
risk
• Strengthening individual capacities – expand access to education, TVSD in particular,
adapted to rural needs, and with specific focus on agriculture
• Continuing to strengthen collective capacities of rural people – to give them confidence,
power and security; help them reduce risk, manage assets, market produce; represent
and negotiate their interests

16. Conditions for smallholder development: New directions for smallholder
agriculture - IFAD 2011
( and after S. Wiggins, 2009)
• Favourable investment climate for farming- no distorting tax/ import
subsidies
• Investment in rural public goods - agric R& D, rural roads, education
and health - care
• Strengthened rural institutions- market support, rural finance, NR
rights, access to technologies, collective action
• Access to K for Sustainable farm intensification

17. RPR - What needs to be done, and how?
1. Smallholder agriculture continues to play a key role in the economic development of many countries
and remains a major source of economic opportunity for rural people – a step up, if not a route out of
poverty.
o What sort of agriculture? In all regions, it must be: commercially oriented and linked to markets;
increasingly productive; sustainable in its use of natural resources; and resilient to shocks and
effects of climate change
2. At the same time, there remains need to harness the drivers of RNFE to create alternative
opportunities for rural men and women to move out of poverty
o A successful agriculture will create possibilities for growth in the RNFE; and will create need for
employment creation in RNFE
o In addition, other new drivers of growth in the RNFE are emerging in some countries

18. Thank you for your attention!