Livestock integration for improving the livelihoods of rural poor

Abstract

This document has been contributed by a group of social scientists and ARD stakeholders, committed to facilitate the GCARD consultation so that it is inclusive of the opinion of all ARD Stakeholders in contributing to increasing net incomes, purchasing power, livelihoods and sustainability of the poor smallholder farmers and producers and their communities in the developing countries. Of the 3 billion people that live in rural areas (nearly half of the humanity), about 2.5 billion are involved in agriculture and 1.5 billion (half of the rural area population) are resource-poor small holders. These resource-poor smallholder farmers and producers concentrated in the rural areas and mountains make up the majority (85%) of farmers in the developing world. They are among the poorest group of farmers and thus become important in the context of eliminating poverty and hunger from the developing world. The Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD) 2010, to be held in Montpellier, France from 28-31 March 2010, should use this paper as the basis to develop an action plan and strategy for improving agricultural research globally in order to make maximum impact on development, especially for the poor small producers. This paper provides an opportunity to all the stakeholders of AR4D to discuss and decide the world agenda for AR4D. Considering the importance of poor smallholder farmers/producers in the developing world, there is a need to utilize this opportunity to change the world agenda for AR4D so that livelihoods and wellbeing of the resource-poor smallholder farmers/producers in the developing countries could be improved. This document, which has suggestions on how the Action Plan could be developed and approved at GCARD also briefly discusses how GFAR and CGIAR could help improve the livelihoods of the smallholder farmers in the developing world. The document discusses the importance, situation of the smallholder farmers in the developing world, and emphasizes the urgent need for action to meet the need based funding, AR4D, extension, etc., to ensure they are enabled to harvest crops of all seasons. It discusses the challenges that have been identified in different regions of the developing world through the GCARD consultation process, which include: (i) Food, nutrition and health security, (ii) Increasing the net incomes and purchasing power and improving livelihoods, (iii) Protecting the environment, (iv) Achieving structural reforms of the agricultural research (AR), education and extension systems, (v) Meeting the special challenges, and (vi) Making ARSs inclusive and follow a bottom up approach. In addition, it takes into consideration the exchanges of the E conference and the F2F, both an important part of the GCARD consultation process. 3 Among the suggestions for the Action Plan, the document lays emphasis that the AR4D should focus on the smallholder farmers’ development needs. Actions for different priority areas of research identified during the GCARD process in different regions are suggested. These include suggestions for: (1) Action for Institutional Issues: Action research, education, extension and linkages and collaboration; (2) Action Research for Development Issues: Improved technology for sustainable production (livestock research including rangelands, horticulture, seed systems, water resources and irrigation management, forestry, fisheries mountain agriculture); (3) Effecting Necessary Policy Shifts: Agricultural development policies, and marketing of agricultural produce/ products; (4) Environment Protection Issues: Reduce agriculture’s large environmental footprint and overcome the challenge of climate change, and protecting biodiversity degradation; (5) Socioeconomic Issues: Gender/women-related issues, and livelihoods and poverty analysis. The document also briefly discusses importance of development pathways and how the developing countries could use them for the priority areas of AR4D. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of an integrated approach to fulfill the requirements for agricultural development. It should be emphasized that the five regions in the developing world have good potential for AR4D in the immediate future. Considering the present state of affairs, the regions could either become self-sufficient and meet their nutrition, health and food needs, or become a potential hot spot for poverty because of: (i) shortage of irrigated land, (ii) shortage of water, (iii) adverse effects of agro-chemicals used on their land and thus the proportionate increased need of water each year and contaminating subsoil water, (iv) increasing population, (v) shortage of safe nutritious and quality food, (vi) climate change and desertification, and (vii) isolation of the world community by the net producers (Australia, Canada, and the USA). Therefore, the issues that are of immediate and vital importance include: (i) Strengthening of the existing potential for knowledge creation, (ii) Strengthening knowledge transfer mechanisms, (iii) Developing collaboration, partnerships and linkages among different stakeholders of AR4D at the national, sub-region, regional and the global levels, and (iv) Focus on the development of poor smallholder farmers and producers in rural and mountainous areas of the developing countries. Considering the above and the potential that all five regions of the developing countries have, it is important that the governments make the required investments in and provide the required support to agriculture and AR4D to meet the needs of the poor smallholder farmers and producers and their communities, which in turn would meet the MDGs. Likewise, the international research and development organizations (CGIAR, FAO, etc.), the regional and international development organizations (IFAD, etc.) and banks (World Bank, Asian Development Bank, African Development Bank, etc.) must come forward to help the regions to ensure the needed funds for agriculture and AR4D, with the specific undertaking that these be used to meet the needs of the poor smallholder farmers and producers. The smallholder farmers/producers have been ignored for a long time, and let us at this stage commit ourselves to help them to overcome their difficulties and improve their livelihoods.