Land reform and the rural poor

At the dawn of the third millennium, three-quarters of the world's 852 million men and women suffering from hunger are found in rural areas and depend on agriculture for their survival.

Most of them are landless farmers or have such tiny or unproductive plots of land that they cannot feed their families.

For many of these poor farmers, new development opportunities in rural areas would allow more equitable access to basic land and water resources while offering an escape from hunger and poverty.

"Agrarian Reform: A Way out of Hunger and Poverty for Millions of Impoverished Small Farmers"

Today delegates from more than 80 countries descended on Porto Alegre, Brazil to participate in the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD). Organized by United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), with the support of the Brazilian government, the conference aims to tackle the tough subjects of "agrarian reform, social justice and sustainable development."

As Parviz Koohafkan, Executive Secretary of ICARRD, affirms:

We have just 10 years to reach 2015, the target date set by the international community to reduce by half the number of hungry people in the world. Since the very poorest are landless farmers everywhere it will not be possible to achieve the Millennium Development Goals unless we find sustainable solutions to the challenge existing in the world's rural areas. It is an appointment we cannot afford to miss.

If we want to reduce hunger and poverty in the world, we must go to the root causes of the problem. And in the poor rural zones, one of the main problems is the lack of secure access to factors of production, particularly land and water.

In this context, today's Prensa Libre newspaper ran a story about rural poverty and Guatemala's indigenous population.

The article, entitled "3 out of 4 Indigenous People are Poor", states that:

According to United Nations data, 70% of the rural Guatemalan population, especially the indigenous population, lives below the poverty line.

Indigenous peoples are the most vulnerable sector within the rural population, as they have the least access to basic services: education, health and housing.

In Guatemala, where they comprise over 40% of the population, three out of every four indigenous people live in poverty, according to the U.N.

The article adds:

The United Nations Development Program's (UNDP) "Human Development Report 2005" places Guatemala amongst the four countries with the greatest inequality of income. The others are Namibia, Central African Republic and Brazil.

37.4% of the Guatemalan population lives on less than US $2 per day. 16% lives on less than US $1 per day.

Resources:

Agrarian Reform: a way out of hunger and poverty for millions of impoverished small farmers

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD)

Prensa Libre - Tres de Cada Cuatro Indígenas Son Pobres

UNDP Human Development Report 2005 - "Inequality and Human Development"

The International Land Coalition

ONU: 850 millones de pobres viven en áreas rurales

Tags: Guatemala, Poverty, Land, Reform, Indigenous

Posted by elcanche at March 6, 2006 11:19 PM