Agriculture and Rural Development
Achieving a more productive, sustainable agricultural sector controlled by farmers organized through well-established structures is the main challenge for 21st-century agriculture in developing countries. Such changes would allow rural populations in developing countries to participate in the provision of food, that is sufficient in both quantity and quality, to a population that will experience rapid growth through the middle of the century.
The year 2007 was marked by a major trend reversal toward shrinkage in almost all international agricultural markets. With steady reductions over the past several years, global cereal stocks experienced further falls after the 2007 harvest, reaching their lowest level in 30 years for wheat and the lowest level in history for coarse grains.
Providing food to urban populations by importing it at artificially low prices on the international market is not viable for the foreseeable future. Food imports will thus weigh heavily on the trade balances of many countries and revive inflationary pressures.
To address this situation, after several years of decline in financial assistance to the agricultural sector, many donors are considering reclassifying rural development as an area for priority intervention. For its part, AFD will earmark 15% of its total development aid for rural development up to 2011.
In this context, AFD has put into place €44 million of coordinated funding for three programs in Cameroon to support the revitalization of agriculture within the framework of the new national strategy (see box).
AFD continues to promote innovative and ecological farming techniques to ensure soil fertility restoration in Tunisia (€41.5 million) and Madagascar (€12.5 million), as well as in agricultural systems in the Sahel Zone through the direct funding of Senegal’s National Association for the Development of Textiles (SODEFITEX) (€11 million).
In Mali, similar activities are being implemented as part of a program to build capacity among cotton producers’ cooperatives, and to promote general institutional reforms (€11 million).
In Burkina Faso, AFD has supported the creation of an adjustment fund to mitigate the effects of commodity price volatility and improve sector governance (€18 million). Other interventions in the agricultural sector include the funding of a proposed irrigation scheme in Egypt’s West Nile Delta area that will be implemented and managed by a private operator (see box).
Along with the Asian Development Bank, AFD has financed equipment and infrastructure programs that will contribute to rural poverty reduction in 13 central provinces of Vietnam (€41 million) and promote ecotourism in the mountainous province of Lao Cai (€22.8 million).
AFD has also continued its support of rural community infrastructure development in the Senegal River region (€7 million), with a special focus on modernizing traditional land tenure policies.
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Supporting Cameroon’s new agricultural strategy
As part of the first Debt Development Contract (C2D), AFD pledged €44 million to the Cameroon government to finance three rural development programs, aiming at: strengthening capacities in the rural sector, renovating agricultural vocational training in rural areas, and improving the competitiveness of family-run farms. These three programs will permit radical change in the roles and operations of Cameroon’s agricultural services, and in the support provided to producers. They will promote the empowerment of producer organizations, as well as the dialogue between the government and farmers. Renovating vocational training will increase the training capacity to 13,000 people per year (versus the current capacity of 5,000) and will create ten public institutions devoted to training countrywide.
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