Achieving sustainable food security (i.e., the basic right of people to produce and/or purchase the food they need, without harming the social and biophysical environment) is a major challenge in a world of rapid human population growth, large-scale changes in economic development and in the face of climate change.

In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), production on smallholder farms is critical to the food security of the rural poor and contributes the majority of food production at the national level.

Sahelian rural populations’ needs are sourced from on-farm indigenous tree species. However, access, use and management of indigenous tree species within their territories are restricted by forestry laws. This has built suspicion and discontent between foresters and natural resource users. Natural resource users argue that they own the trees on their farms; in contrast, the state claims to own protected indigenous trees on farms as stipulated in the forestry laws. These mismatches have served to increase deforestation despite stringent penalties and use of permits and licenses.

This paper provides an overview of what we know about farm size distributions, the emerging land markets, the role of tenure systems, tenure reforms and land policies in shaping the distribution of increasingly scarce land resources. The primary focus is on Africa while making some comparisons with Asia. Climate risk and change have serious implications for household vulnerability and food security. While there is a need to absorb further population growth in rural areas, a rapid rise in rural-urban migration is inevitable.

The triple challenge of rapid population growth, declining agricultural productivity, and natural resource degradation are not isolated from one another; they are intimately related. However, strategic planning and development programming tend to focus on individual sectors such as the environment, agriculture, and population; they do not explicitly take into account the compatibilities and inconsistencies among them. Farm households and their livelihood strategies are at the core of the intersectoral linkages approach advocated in this chapter.

CAADP Policy Brief 10by Kate Wellard-Dyer

This paper explores gender and issues of land access and administration in rural development. It argues that increasing social, economic and technological changes are requiring a re-examination of the institutional arrangements used to administer who has rights to what resources and under what conditions.

This background note, published by the Overseas Development Institute, provides an overview of the potential risks and vulnerabilities that face the water sector due to climate change. It also summarises of some of the adaptive strategies, targeting both supply and demand of water, being employed across various sectors in the developing world and offers suggestions going forward. It concludes by assessing how current knowledge of climate change can help inform future planning of water sector interventions.

Concentrates on the black smallholder farming sector. Policy objectives should include:Resource Conserving Technologies: re-orientation away from large scale farmers, consideration of goals other than high input/output (risk management, labour input, gender).

This scoping report provides context and analysis for addressing agriculture in international climate negotiations with the aim of informing climate negotiators and other stakeholders of different options and unpacking issues of interest. It observes that agriculture is characterised by a number of special features that distinguish it from other sectors, like producing food and meeting basic survival needs. Its context and site-specific nature makes uniform strategies and solutions ineffective and, unlike other sectors, it is directly affected by climate change.

Foreign acquisitions of farm land in developing countries have become the focus of concern. Many observers consider them a new form of colonialism that threatens food security of the poor. However, investments could be good news if the objectives of land purchasers are reconciled with the investment needs of developing countries. The paper finds that land for agriculture in developing countries has become a target of international investments because of the following:

For cities to be sustainable, they need to simultaneously address the vulnerability of people, places and sectors that may be affected by a changing climate; mitigate their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; and ensure adequate access to basic urban services such as water, food and energy to their growing populations. 

Deforestation arising from conversion of forest areas into agriculture is a serious problem in Malawi. This paper discusses competition for agricultural land and investigates why the poor are closely associated with forests. Furthermore, the paper examines the effects of changes in crop land use on changes in forest cover. The author notes that the government of Malawi, like many others in sub-Saharan Africa, is currently faced with the problem of poverty. Moreover, being agricultural based most poverty reduction policies are streamlined along the agricultural sector.