Village Settlement in Kordofan Region, Sudan
Source: Aziz Merzouk
How to empower the rural poor to get out of poverty? Projects aimed at improving the situation of the rural poor sometimes fail not because they were poorly designed, but because the policy and economic environment in which they were initiated changes in unpredictable ways. In the Near East and North Africa Region (NENA), policy and economic reforms including sector and structural adjustment programs aimed at economic liberalization, privatization of public assets and decentralization, have been proceeding in fits and starts. This has created a volatile policy environment, making it difficult for development institutions to design effective programs.
Recognizing this situation, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is funding a three-year IFPRI study to examine how to create local institutions that empower the poor and give them the flexibility to adjust to an evolving and unstable policy and economic environment. Increased capabilities are key to enabling the poor to act as agents of change both at individual and group levels.
The study focuses on policies aimed at devolving the responsibility for natural resource management from the national governments to territorial communities at the local level. The overall research plan includes three phases, namely:
- definition of the conceptual framework and research method,
- development of three national case studies for Morocco, Sudan and Tunisia, and
- a regional workshop followed by a dissemination phase.
The research is conducted by national teams with the methodological and material support of the IFPRI-IFAD project.
Overview of Research Issues and Agenda- Determine what institutional and policy conditions foster the empowerment of the rural poor with particular reference to policies that aim at devolving the management of natural resources to the local level
- Examine the implications of the research findings for country development strategies and donors' intervention strategies