Water for agriculture draws on a range of sources - from naturally available water bodies to water supply infrastructure. In sub-Saharan Africa, only a very small percentage of arable land is irrigated. Most farmers produce food under rainfed conditions. In 1995, for instance, 89 percent of…

Across rural Africa, land legislation struggles to be properly implemented, and most resource users gain access to land on the basis of local land tenure systems. Although such systems claim to draw their legitimacy from “tradition” and are commonly referred to as “customary” (and for easier…

This introductory section covers the period since the submission of the last Mid-Term
Plan until present, and concentrates on the following areas:
> Principal areas of progress.
> Developments in 2005 and early 2006.
> Changes to the CPMT strategic…

The World Trade Organization (WTO) hailed the recent Hong Kong Sixth Ministerial Meeting last December 2005 as a positive movement towards the conclusion of the Doha Development Round. The round was supposedly geared towards ensuring that trade contributes to the development objectives of least…

The paper discusses the application of the Water Poverty Index (WPI) as a monitoring tool for Benin’s water sector. Benin is currently in a process of political decentralization shifting responsibility for and administration of rural water supplies from the national to the communal level.…

Following the example of Tiffen et al. on Machakos, Kenya, new macro-based evidence was collected in Machakos, the neighbouring Kitui district and in Benin, Cameroon and the Philippines, to assess the factors à la Boserup, inducing transitions towards sustainable land management, such as…

‘Poor soils make poor people, and poor people make soils worse’. This is a situation that can be seen in many ACP countries. What information support can be offered...

Quels enseignements peut-on tirer des expériences de mise en œuvre des Plans fonciers ruraux dans la perspective de la formulation de politiques et de législations foncières adaptées en Afrique de l’Ouest et d’amélioration des stratégies de sécurisation foncière des droits des…

FAO’s goal is to alleviate poverty and hunger by promoting sustainable agricultural development, improved nutrition and food security, and ensuring that everyone has access at all times to the food they need for an active and healthy life. The importance of biological diversity for food security…