Agriculture is the hardest policy area for international development organisations to reform, according to a research report.
The analysis, published on (30 April) by US research partnership AidData, found that aid organisations were more likely to achieve policy shifts in the realm of democracy and decentralisation of government power than in farming.
The report, The marketplace of ideas for policy change, examined how international and non-governmental organisations shape policy changes in low- and middle-income countries. The team interviewed more than 6,700 policymakers and aid professionals from 126 countries to gauge what works.
“In agriculture, the probability of success in reform implementation is lower than any other policy domain,” says Brad Parks, the co-executive director of AidData, which analyses data on global development spending.
He says this may be because land right conflicts in many developing countries exacerbate the difficulties in reforming agricultural policies and implementing those changes on the ground.
Source: SciDev.net
