Key Messages

1. If the current trend in soil, water and forest degra­dation is to be arrested, productivity and environmen­tal sustainability must be addressed in an integrated fashion. While part of the solution may involve the appli­cation of technologies, a comprehensive solution depends on appropriate institutional arrangements and policies to ensure an integrated approach to natural resources manage­ment. One option is to provide systems of incentives that promote sustainable resource use.

2. If the poverty associated with rainfed agriculture is to be reduced, policies and resources will need to be extended to agriculture in arid, semi-arid and upland areas. Policies might include encouraging the use of local­ly adapted varieties and conservation agriculture, such as moisture conservation and zero or minimum tillage.

3. A variety of agricultural technologies will need to be applied in an integrated, site-specific manner if agri­cultural, environmental and development goals are to be realized. Organic, traditional and local systems and in­tegrated nutrient and pest management can capitalize on the expanding domestic and global demand for food produced in ways that minimize costs to human and environmental health and reduce fossil fuel dependency. Such technologies are especially advantageous to rural producers constrained by access to credit, external inputs and extension services. Transgenics, nanotechnology and precision agriculture may positively affect natural resource and human welfare by re­ducing pesticide use and providing inexpensive vaccine de­livery, but should be deployed under site-specific scientific and social monitoring within a stringent biosafety frame­work.

4. To improve agricultural performance and rural live­lihoods, availability and access to information and communication technologies that facilitate the rapid dissemination and exchange of information will need to be enhanced. Frameworks for information exchange among farmers, extension workers, researchers and policy­makers need to be flexible, adaptable, inter-related and sci­ence-based with a capacity to incorporate as well as develop new knowledge streams. This may be accomplished through decision tools, e-learning modules, and market information systems accessible through mobile technologies and com­puter kiosks as evident among producers in Bangladesh, China, India and the Philippines.

5. Integrating the complementary expertise of actors involved in AKST will be necessary if the rural sector is to respond and benefit from the growing complexity of regional agricultural development. To benefit from the opportunities offered by public-private partnerships, poten­tial patterns of interaction need to be identified and current constraints overcome. Stakeholder meetings, institutional reforms, funding and other fiscal policy measures offer op­portunities for promoting such collaboration.

6. If community livelihoods and the rural economy are to be enhanced, discriminatory barriers that limit the participation of women, indigenous peoples, certain caste groups, religious and ethnic minorities need to be identified and eliminated. This may be accomplished through the development and implementation of policies and governance structures, anti-discrimination legislation and by ensuring access to public services and markets.

7. The capacity of women agricultural producers, as holders of AKST, needs to be strengthened if household and community livelihoods are to be improved. Given the feminization of agriculture and women's limited access to resources and markets, this may be accomplished by empow­ering women to secure access to and manage land, knowl­edge and technologies that recognize their economic contri­bution to agricultural production, ensure wage parity and providing women with vocational and technical training.

8. To help ensure equitable access to environmentally sustainable and appropriate technologies, differences in technological capacity and the specific needs of countries in the development of Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) policies will need to be recognized. IPRs may create barriers to trade and limit the capacity of de­veloping countries to move up the science and technology ladder. The appropriateness and fairness of the patent sys­tem when applied to biodiversity and traditional and local knowledge are urgent concerns in the conservation of natu­ral resources and access of the poor to them.

9. The capacities of various actors require strengthen­ing if the opportunities arising from global trade in­tegration, the information and communication revolu­tion are to work to the benefit of the rural economy.
The capacities of farmers, researchers, local governments, extension workers, financial institutions,  local entrepre­neurs and market agents, agroindustry and NGOs may be enhanced through training, professional exchange and vo­cational education. Efforts in the areas of research, policy and governance, extension and training could include: (1) traditional and emerging technologies, (2) international reg­ulations, IPRs, trade negotiations, institutional reforms, (3) support systems not limited to production such as organi­zational, marketing, entrepreneurship to farmers, producer groups and NGOs and (4) the non-farm rural sector.

10. If economic development is to become sustain­able given increasing global competitiveness, mem­ber states will need to develop their external trade relations taking into account that the latter can affect the achievement of development goals. This can be ac­complished by (1) configuring and phasing sub-regional in­tegration in ways that enable the development of a global, non-discriminatory trading system, (2) ensuring that Agree­ment on Agriculture (AoA) reforms take into account their impact on the divergent agricultural sector/s in the region, (3) improving the quality and coherence of regional trade policies and decision-making and monitoring the impact of competitive trade regimes that address environment, health