The devastating environmental effects of deforestation and the exploitation of other natural resources in the developing world have been well documented, yet their impact on local communities has received far less attention. This report looks at how land degradation and deforestation are being...

Market liberalization, though an important element in economic reforms in developing countries in the past two decades, has been accused of harming the poor through higher food prices, layoffs in formerly state-owned enterprises, and the erosion of social safety net programs. Since the 1980s...

Differences and similarities in the development paths taken by six East Asian economies (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, South Korea, and Taiwan) provide a fertile ground for policy analysis from which important lessons are drawn and major challenges identified for the Indochinese...

Almost two decades have passed since China first enacted legislation to protect farmland from conversion to nonagricultural use. Yet hundreds of thousands of hectares of agricultural land are still developed to urban area each year, raising the question of whether the legislation is effective in...

The institutional change in rural Kyrgyzstan during the transition period included farm reorganization, land reform, building markets, and community institutions. The land reform established private property rights to land, including the rights to transfer, exchange, sell, lease, and use the...

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...