ICARDA’s mission is to alleviate poverty by improving the livelihoods of farming communities. Often, the key is to add value to primary crop and livestock outputs. This issue of Caravan provides glimpses of the Center’s work to help farmers and pastoralists add value to their products, and thereby improve their...

During 2004 and 2005, the Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM), assisted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), carried out case studies in Belize, Dominica, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago and the Turks and Caicos Islands on the consideration of socio-economic and demographic concerns in...

This issue of Caravan looks at different aspects of desertification; and how ICARDA and its partners are working together to help farming communities find effective, sustainable solutions. These collaborative efforts have generated significant impacts at community level – higher crop yields, more sustainable farming systems, more incomegenerating opportunities for the...

The objective of this study, commissioned by the FAO Regional Office for Europe and SDRR, is to analyse the status of and future needs for information and communication systems of private and government organizations in the national agricultural research system and its relevant partners with respect to agro-ecological and organic...

Following the request of the Government of the Republic of Croatia, in September 2003 the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) funded a technical assistance project for Croatia. The overall objective of this project was to improve rural income and food security through diversified production and specialty...

This document contains the results of a study conducted to collect information to be used in devising a marketing strategy for Croatian organic and Protected designation of origin (PDO), Protected geographic indication (PGI) and Traditional specialty guaranteed (TSG) products. In part one, the main performance indicators of Croatian agriculture are...

The objective of this study, commissioned by the FAO Regional Office for Europe and SDRR, is to analyse the status of and future needs for information and communication systems of private and government organizations in the national agricultural research system and its relevant partners with respect to agro-ecological and organic...

European consumers have become increasingly more aware of food safety issues, as a consequence of a number of food ‘scandals’. Most of these ‘scandals’ have been related to livestock products. However, most consumers still believe that it is possible to produce ‘safe’ food at low prices, while a small group...

All stakeholders in the organic livestock food chain have different priorities with respect to food quality. Stakeholders include producers, wholesalers, retailers, advisory bodies, certification groups, regulatory and inspection groups (such as environmental health officers & food microbiologists) and the consumer. Due to the wide range in requirements by these different...

Economic reforms launched in the early 1990s have significantly affected Czech agriculture for more than a decade. First was the reform of property rights to land, which was considered an underlying condition for the effective functioning of a market economy. The reform was built upon three principals: restitution of land...

Over 1 million people became landowners during the mass privatization and reorganization of collective farms in Moldova. More than 200,000 peasant farms, second one – “Survey of farm managers”, were conducted by at import owing 1.8 ha of land each, and became the most typical economic entities farming this land....

Russian dairy enterprises underwent dramatic changes during 1990-2001. Not much is known about the position of these enterprises under the new conditions. This study examined a sample group of dairy enterprises in the Moscow region to try to identify similarities and divergences in historical background, performance, managerial and structural characteristics....

Building on existing models for the role of agriculture in industrialized and developing countries, this chapter examines a number of critical aspects of agriculture’s role in Central and Eastern European (CEE) rural development. By reviewing the contributions of this proceedings volume, we focus on the perspectives of small farms, rural...

This paper discusses the trickle-down effects of productivity growth in Agriculture and trade-offs between agricultural aggregate productivity growth and rural poverty alleviation. Empirically, we attempt to establish the link between agricultural productivity growth and the distribution of incomes in rural areas, the price for grains – a major agricultural commodity,...

The paper develops a new perspective in social capital theory by outlining the significance of social capital for organizational development and change. Different mechanisms of economic coordination such as markets, hierarchies and teams have been shown to exhibit various and consistent social capital-dependence. Accordingly, insufficient amount of social capital is...

The paper discusses the impact of industrialized countries' agricultural policy on the development of rural areas, with special reference to the CAP. Against the background of the principles of rural development policy it analyses effects on employment and environmental objectives in rural areas. The impact of agricultural market policies is...

Russian rural areas (populated areas outside towns and cities) occupy two thirds of the country territory. Practically all Russian constituent regions have rural areas, though varying by their share in a region’s total area and by their population number. In the Southern and European Russia and Siberia the former reaches...

This paper aim is to examine various assumptions referring to the increase of subsistence farming in Slovakia during the transformation period. Based on statistical data from small landholdings and individual, non-registered farms in various regions of the country (districts with high and low unemployment, eastern and northern versus western and...

The objective of the paper is to analyse the evolution and strategies of Albanian farms in order to understand the process of adapting to the market economy, to outline the role of agriculture in the country's socio-economic development and to identify future strategies of public policies in rural areas. The...

Georgia is one of the poorest countries in the former Soviet bloc. Over half of its 4.7 million people live below the poverty line, second only to Romania among central and eastern European countries. The purpose of this paper is to describe the grassroots reality of the country’s agricultural sector...