Development Policies and Strategies

India's agricultural system is at an important stage in its transformation. In India, the average land tenure for farmers is 1.08 hectares, and 86 percent of the settlements are less than two hectares in size. In addition, small and scale farmers are often trapped in a vicious cycle of low productivity and subsistence farming due to insufficient access to information, technology, and financial services. Therefore, an important policy question that arises is how information and market access issues can be overcome by poor farmers with resources. Traditionally, a key means of information dissemination and innovation for many emerging economies are agricultural extension services that are supported by the public sector. In this program, extension agents train poor farmers with resources directly on best practices or work closely with selected 'model farmers' who try new farming methods and pass them on to other farmers. It is suggested that your personal digital extension services could be used to enhance the public sector's efforts to provide agricultural-related information in rural areas. However, for these digital extension services to be an effective tool, some basic infrastructure such as roads, electricity, telephone network and internet access need to be accessible, which may require government support.

Executive Summary:  A two-day planning workshop on RUL was conducted from August 29-30, in Addis Ababa. The primary objective of the planning workshop was to enrich the draft conceptual framework for the RUL Thematic research area and devise the way forward for action research/development intervention to strengthen RUL and thereby support the development efforts of the country. The workshop was attended by 80 participants drawn from federal and regional government offices, higher learning institutions, civil society organizations, private sector and International Agricultural Research Centers. The workshop was officially opened with welcoming and opening remarks by high level officials from EIAR, GMP, EPA and MoARD.
The workshop was organized in to paper presentation sessions and group work sessions followed by a panel discussion. The first day of the workshop was dedicated for paper presentations and second day for group work and panel discussions.
Key outcomes of the workshop:
- Cognizing that RUL was a missing element in Ethiopia’s development endeavor and the consideration of RUL in PASDEP, a general agreement was reached that the initiative will be instrumental in providing vital information in addressing the current gap.
- While endorsing the proposed sub-thematic areas, it was recommended to depict clearly the interconnections between the sub themes in the design of the conceptual framework (see Figure 2 of the paper presented by Gete Zeleke (Page 30) which shows the revised conceptual framework as per the recommendation).
- Priority action areas were identified under each sub-theme to be incorporated in the improved version of the concept note. The identified priority action areas are:
° Flow analysis (goods and services)
• Natural resources – flows of water , energy, sediment, nutrients , pollutants within rural-urban continuum;
• Products flow (Value chain analysis) – flows of forest, crop (including high value horticultural products) and livestock products and by products; agricultural inputs; market and market infrastructure;
• Labor flow (migration) – migration (RU, RR, UR, cross boarder) including flows of remittance/capital and gender and  age relations;
• Knowledge and information flow – analysis of flows of market and other information, skills, services, etc;
° Policy and institutional analysis
• Policy – rural policies, urban policies, RUL-relevant common policies and International conventions and agreements including land tenure policies;
• Institution – public, private and communal institutions both in rural and urban settings, issues related to institutional linkages and stability;
° Livelihoods analysis
• Economic activity options including new frontiers such as
➢ The role of tourism as alternative livelihood options within RUL setting
➢ Value adding, etc…
• Natural resources (NR) and livelihood options (analysis of the interdependence of poverty and land degradation)
• Analyzing peri-urban and urban agriculture – going for business unusual intervention to improve livelihoods
• Impacts of cultural values and norms towards improved livelihood options and solutions
• Physical distance and livelihood options
• Migration as livelihoods option within the RUL context  – challenges, opportunities and actions
• Factors affecting choice of livelihood options in rural and urban settings
• Policy and institutional requirements to improve livelihoods within RUL context
° Cross cutting issues
• Capacity building requirements (on system development and spatial planning and the inter-linkage with sectoral planning approaches)
• Gender and HIV/AIDS
- Baseline research to identify key gaps, opportunities and intervention areas related to the three sub-thematic areas is recommended as a first activity.
- The workshop recommends that the RUL initiative need to be strongly linked with the national R&D system.
- The proposal to establish a RUL platform was endorsed as a freestanding organ. List of members of the platform, TOR (including roles and responsibilities) to be developed later.
- Strong collaboration by different stakeholders was emphasized and recommended that the platform shall be one avenue to ensure close collaboration.
- In addition to the benchmark site and satellite cities  proposed, it was recommended to include emerging urban areas such as Assosa and Gambella


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Tourism is a significant contributor to GDP, employment and to the international appreciation of a country and its culture – regardless of its level of development. This policy analysis seeks to assist the Least
Developed Countries (LDCs) in harnessing development opportunities by providing a comprehensive overview of existing international  development instruments, i.e., Diagnostic Trade Integration Studies
(DTISs) and their Action Matrices, Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs), and reviewing their alignment with the national tourism development strategies, investment policies and tourism related trade
arrangements. The authors encourage the use of findings from this analysis by all actors and stakeholders engaged with trade facilitation activities in LDCs. In reviewing these key development policy
documents, this in-depth analysis seeks to better equip LDCs to manage international policy advice provided by a multitude of international development partners. The ultimate objective of this work is to support their achievement of greater social and economic benefits through growth trade in tourism services. It is also hoped that this analytical report will enhance the coherence and complimentarity of tourism development advice proposed by the international community via drawing attention to policy gaps and implementation vacuums existing within the tourism supply and value chain.