India has nearly 90 million farm households. More than 80 percent of these farmers operate on a small or marginal scale, farming less than two hectares of land. They also usually have one or two buffaloes or cows, reared for milk and dung. Most of these small and marginal farmers fall below the...

"Cotton, textiles, and apparel are critical agricultural and industrial sectors in India. This study provides descriptions of these sectors and examines the key developments emerging domestically and internationally that affect the challenges and opportunities the sectors face. More than four...

"Cotton, textiles, and apparel are critical agricultural and industrial sectors in Pakistan. This study provides descriptions of these sectors and examines the key developments emerging domestically and internationally that affect the challenges and opportunities they face. One-quarter of...

"During the past several decades dramatic improvement has occurred in agricultural productivity and livelihoods in South and East Asia, stimulated by the Green Revolution and supported by several other factors. Nevertheless, hundreds of millions of rural people in less-favored environments of...

"This paper reviews the trends in government subsidies and investments in and for Indian agriculture; develops a conceptual framework and model to assess the impact of various subsidies and investments on agricultural growth and poverty reduction; and, presents several reform options with regard...

Taking successful development interventions to scale is critical if the world is to achieve the Millennium Development Goals and make essential gains in the fight for improved agricultural productivity, rural incomes, and nutrition. How to support scaling up in these three areas, however, is a...

Rural producer organizations, such as farmers' organizations or rural cooperatives, offer a means for smallholder farmers in developing countries to sell their crops commercially. They hold particular promise for Sub-Saharan Africa, where small-scale farming is the primary livelihood but...

To examine aspirations in rural Pakistan, we carried out an aspirations module with almost 5,000 individuals as part of a comprehensive household survey. Using respondents’ answers to questions about their aspirations in four dimensions (income, wealth, education, and social status), we...

""Smallholders in Ghana, as elsewhere, are widely considered to be the largest as well as the most vulnerable component of the rural sector. Ghana professes national development objectives of reducing rural poverty through the increased productivity and commercialization of smallholder...