Acteurs Ressources Territoires ART-Dév

Les agricultures familiales sont au coeur des transformations mais aussi des contradictions contemporaines de l’agriculture. Elles ont été et sont toujours le creuset d’innombrables innovations ainsi que des grandes révolutions agricoles. Elles forment la base sociale de la plupart des pays des Suds et contribuent à l’approvisionnement de leurs marchés locaux, nationaux et internationaux. Néanmoins, elles constituent, de manière paradoxale, la grande masse des ménages ruraux pauvres et en situation d’insécurité alimentaire à l’échelle mondiale. Elles opèrent parfois selon des modèles intensifiés (agrochimie et motorisation), spécialisés et très fortement artificialisés. À ce titre, elles n’échappent pas aux questions et critiques adressées à l’agriculture et à sa capacité à répondre aux défis contemporains et largement mondialisés du changement climatique, de la sécurité alimentaire, de la raréfaction des ressources fossiles, de la prévention des maladies émergentes. Mais, les agric...

Family farms are central to both contemporary changes and contradictions in agriculture. They have been, and are still, the crucible for a whole host of agricultural innovations and major revolutions. They form the social basis of most Southern countries and contribute to supplying their local, national and international markets. Paradoxically, however, they constitute the vast majority of poor rural households which are also in a situation of food insecurity worldwide. They sometimes operate using specialised, and highly artificialised, intensified models (agrochemicals and mechanisation). In this respect, they do not escape the questions and criticism directed to agriculture and its capacity to meet the contemporary and widely globalised challenges of climate change, food security, the increasing scarcity of fossil fuels, and the prevention of emerging diseases. But family farms also provide alternative production models to conventional intensification – sustainable agriculture mo...

This country case study has been financed by the OECD Development Centre, in partnership
with Korean authorities, for the preparation of its Rural Development Policy in Perspective.
The collectivization process in agriculture led to disappointing economic results and to
severe food crises at the end of the 1970s. The difficulty in developing economic
diversification prompted the government to engage in a radical policy shift, the Doï Moï, and
to launch the renovation of the economy with a move towards a market-oriented economy.
For long, rural development policies did not exist, as such. A specific rural development
strategy, going beyond the classic agricultural objectives, emerged in 2007 and translated
into the New Rural Development Program (NTP-NRD). The program put emphasis on three
elements: a willingness to mobilize rural communities, and thus to support local initiatives
through public investments; the objective of limiting urban–rural disparities through
multidimensional policies (economic and social); and strong commitment from the
government at the different administrative levels. The country was able to adapt to the
challenges of globalization, although the cost is rising in social and spatial inequalities. To
deal with the growing costs of urbanization and the challenges of climate change, the longstanding
tradition of top-down approaches will have to connect with necessary bottom-up
processes.

This country case study has been financed by the OECD Development Centre, in partnership with
Korean authorities, for the preparation of its Rural Development Policy in Perspective. Agriculture has
played a critical role in Thai development trajectory and was for long a focus of government’s efforts.
It has supported industrial development through transfers of labour and capital, and with a
downstream strategy promoting the transformation of products. It resulted in the emergence of
national champions with large agro-businesses. The progressive integration of overall rural
development objectives into the policy agenda occurred in parallel with an effective and continuous
effort towards the improvement of living conditions in rural areas and human development. Thailand
has a good record in terms of access to basic services due to a continuous investment in rural
infrastructure (roads, water and electricity) education and health. However, rural–urban disparities,
as well as lagging regions, remain a critical issue for the government. More has to be done than
providing compensatory measures, and new, integrated and place-based strategies need to be
designed in order to address the existing challenges related to mega-urbanisation, food safety issues
and new consumers’ requirements, climate change, and the degradation of the natural environment.
The necessary policy shift raises the question of effective decentralisation and the need to strengthen
local governments.

This country case study has been financed by the OECD Development Centre, in partnership with
Korean authorities, for the preparation of its Rural Development Policy in Perspective:
The review longitudinal review of 4 national development strategies (Ivory Coast, Tanzania, Thailand
and Vietnam) pointed the importance of reconnecting issues and of avoiding the “rural island”
syndrome which would systematically lead to policy failures because of inappropriate targets and
priorities and missing issues. However, the rapid changes in the ways in which people live, as a
consequence of gradual improvement in infrastructure (road networks, improved transportation,
new information systems, the mobile phone revolution), have profoundly modified the countryside.
Moreover, the local effects of globalisation on developing countries’ rural areas have resulted in the
weakening of historical ties between agriculture, industrialisation and urbanisation that have
structured past economic transitions. As a consequence of these on-going dynamics, if there is a
quest for a new rural development paradigm for developing countries, the answer would most
probably be in a necessary shift towards local and regional development.

In this commentary we critically discuss the suitability of payments for ecosystem services and the most important challenges they face. While such instruments can play a role in improving environmental governance, we argue that over-reliance on payments as win-win solutions might lead to ineffective outcomes, similar to earlier experience with integrated conservation and development projects. Our objective is to raise awareness, particularly among policy makers and practitioners, about the limitations of such ...