Global Poverty Reduction Support

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The potential contribution of all-year-round vegetable farming to promote good health, nutrition, poverty reduction, and sustainable natural resources management has too long been overlooked by development partners. Vegetable farming plays an important role in meeting the food and nutritional needs of rural communities, livelihood improvement, poverty reduction and sustainable management of natural resources. In the developing countries, 70 to 75% of the poor and hungry live in rural areas. Farming is, therefore, at the heart of their livelihood strategies, as demonstrated by the International Fund for Agricultural Development’s (IFAD) Rural Poverty Report (2001) and reiterated by the World Bank Rural Development Strategy (2002). Moreover, worsening standards of living in rural areas drive desperate people to the cities, thereby exacerbating urban poverty and a further decline of agriculture and rural economies.