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 overty, one may argue, is a relative term, but we must not accept this argument.
Almost one billion people live in 41 countries of the world which are classified by ICARDA as constituting the dry areas. Of these, 46% live in low-income countries of the West Asia and North Africa (WANA) region, and 24% in non-WANA low-income countries. The per capita GDP of some 700 million of these people is less than US$2 per day; indeed, for 142 million of them it is less than a dollar per day. Approximately 72% of these poor people live in the rural areas and depend largely on agriculture for their livelihood.
Poverty in these areas can mean a progressive neglect of farm resources-a danger highlighted in an article in the first issue of Caravan back in 1995, when we reported on the challenges facing small farmers in the Anatolian plateau. This danger can be exacerbated in some countries where remittances from overseas keep people on farms that would not otherwise support them. It is a hidden danger.
But more serious is the way in which the poor are being forced to use up the environmental capital in their struggle to produce more. And this is happening more in the dry areas than anywhere else, simply because the environment in these areas is very fragile. A good example is that of water. In parts of the West Asia and North Africa region, the water table is falling at the rate of a meter a year because, in many places, non-renewable ground water sources are being mined for irrigation. All too often, inappropriate irriga
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tion leads to soil salinity, so that another form of capital-the land itself-is lost. At the same time overgrazing continues to turn marginal lands into desert at an alarming rate. With no or little water, land and biodiversity left, the people who farmed the land tend to leave such areas. Research must be a vehicle to address this vicious cycle.
Where will the people have gone? There is no new land for them to cultivate. They will take their chances in urban areas where the infrastructure is already unable to support them, and employment opportunities are often insufficient for those already there. Or they will attempt to migrate to countries that no longer have room for them. This can lead to both social and political upheaval.
If we are to prevent environmental capital from being exhausted in this way, we must give people the means to protect it. The knowledge generated from agricultural research can help break the complex cycle of poverty and the loss of natural resources. It can help in identifying the factors that lead to the creation of such a cycle, and in developing appropriate solutions. It can offer technologies that will help not only in increasing food production but also in generating increased income. Through a participatory approach, agriculture can integrate the poor into the research process, better use their productive capacity and generate a sense of ownership of the natural resources in them. A carefully-designed program of agricultural research can greatly help in poverty alleviation and protection of the natural resource base.
The 1992 Earth Summit in Rio was titled The
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