On May 12, the Lead Author, Mr. Derek Byerlee presented the World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development at the World Bank Country Office in Chisinau. Invited to this event were the Minister of Agriculture and Food Industries, Mr. Gorodenco, and his Deputy Minister, Mr. Perju. Participants from other ministries, government agencies, the civil society and the private sector, along with journalists participated at this event.

The overall message of the World Development Report 2008 is that agriculture is a vital development tool for alleviating poverty throughout the world. Three out of every four poor people in developing countries live in rural areas, and most of them depend directly or indirectly on agriculture for their livelihoods. The WDR provides guidance to governments and the international community on designing and implementing agriculture-for-development agendas that can make a difference in the lives of hundreds of millions of rural poor. In especially agriculture-based economies, agricultural productivity growth is vital for stimulating growth in other parts of the economy. But accelerated growth requires a sharp productivity increase in smallholder farming combined with more effective support to the millions coping as subsistence farmers, many of them in remote areas.

Recent improved performance holds promise, and this year’s World Development Report identifies many emerging successes that can be scaled up. The report also focuses on ways to generate rural jobs by diversifying into labor-intensive, high-value agriculture linked to a dynamic rural, non-farm sector, in order to reduce widening rural-urban income disparities throughout the world that have proven persistent despite out-migration from rural areas.

Mr. Byerlee showed several examples on where Moldova differs from other countries with more productive agricultural sectors. One important are is that of investment in research and development, where Moldova is lagging far behind more productive countries. Mr. Byerlee also pointed at the importance of better targeting subsidies and public support to the agricultural sector.

The comments from the participants were that though the agricultural sector in Moldova is decreasing in importance for the overall economy, many of the messages of the WDR are still valid also here. Minister Gorodenco underlined the importance of the agricultural sector for Moldova’s economy, not the least the agro-processing industry’s high share of the industrial sector. Minister Gorodenco also pointed out that the ministry is already in the process of implementing several of the recommendations of the WDR, such as increasing the share of subsidies allocated to investments and research. With regards to the latter, participants emphasized that it is important with an efficient two-way communication between research institutes and farmers in order to ensure optimal use of investments in research and the outcomes.

The topic of increasing the opportunity for the agricultural sector and its role in development is of particular importance in the context of the current increases in global food prices.

Here are some materials presented during the event:

WDR08_Overview_ENG.pdf (781 kb), 
WDR08_SA_Overview_RUS.pdf (1,106 kb)

WDR_eng_vs2.ppt (1,705 kb)
WDR_rom_vs3.ppt (3,041 kb)

Link to the report main page: www.worldbank.org/wdr2008