Ethiopia - Agriculture and Rural Development : Public Expenditure Review for 1997-98 and 2005-06

Agricultural and Rural Development (ARD) is a fundamental component of Ethiopia's economic growth and poverty reduction strategy. The agricultural development strategy under Agriculture Development Led Industrialization (ADLI) and Sustainable Development and Poverty Reduction Program (SDPRP) focused on enhancing the productive capacity of smallholder farmers, promoting crop diversification, shifting to a market based system, ensuring food security at the household level and strengthening emergency responses, building up the fragile livelihoods of pastoral communities, and increasing rural water supply coverage. The series of policies put in place in the 1990s included a more supportive macro-economic framework, liberalized markets for agricultural products, and an extension and credit-led push on seed and fertilizer. Following the drought of 2002/03, the government increased its focus on safety nets, and the 2006 Plan of Accelerated and Sustained Development to End Poverty (PASDEP) emphasizes rural-urban linkages and the promotion of rural non-farm enterprises, with continued efforts to tackle vulnerability and food security. Promoting gender equality is a key component of the strategy.