Mark Holderness, GFAR Executive Secretary, was invited as a moderator for the Network development meeting of the Eurasian Centre for Food Security (ECFS) in Moscow, Russian Federation, from 18 to 20 November 2013. Dr Holderness gave a keynote presentation titled "Shaping the future together: Transforming agricultural research, education, extension and enterprise for development" summarizing the rationale for the changes agreed in the GCARD Road Map and then taken up by the wide range of stakeholders delivering the GFAR Medium Term Plan.

West Africa’s smallholders are dynamic and innovative and, if given the opportunity, could easily and sustainably double or treble their productivity. This would have a huge impact on the region’s food security and economic growth. The Convergence of Sciences programme has spent the past decade exploring new pathways for agricultural innovation that focus on enabling smallholders to capture opportunity.

The sector review includes seven chapters and one annex. This first chapter is an overview of agriculture, irrigation and the purpose and content of this report. The second chapter provides a review of the Bank s own strategy and priorities for irrigation and drainage within its portfolio of investments, from the time of its 2004 Strategy until the present. It also includes a short summary of key lessons learned in this sector.

This report presents the outcome of the World Bank's analytical and advisory work to assess the status of water resources development and the key water issues and challenges facing the country. The Bank has also reviewed its history of cooperation with the Government of China in recent decades, and notes the remarkable achievements China has made in developing the water sector. The report proposes solutions for tackling the enormous challenges facing China in the sector.

This paper reviews Pakistan's agriculture performance and analyzes its agriculture and water policies. It discusses the nature of rural poverty and emphasizes the reasons why agricultural growth is a critical component to any pro-poor growth strategy for Pakistan. It supports these arguments by summarizing key results from recent empirical analysis where the relative benefits of agricultural versus non-agricultural led growth are examined. The results also provide an illustration of farm and non-farm linkages.

Urban agriculture contributes to local economic development, poverty alleviation, the social inclusion of the urban poor and women, as well as to the greening of the city and the productive reuse of urban wastes. Urban agriculture encompasses a wide variety of production systems in both urban as well as peri-urban areas. This study examines the contribution of urban agriculture to livelihoods, food security, health, and the urban environment through an assessment of existing urban agriculture activities among poor households in four selected cities.

The aim of the rapid assessment is to support the transition from emergency post conflict recovery to a development approach. The completion of the water, sanitation, and hygiene, or WASH strategic framework in 2011 was intended to mark the beginning of this transition in the water resources sector. Among other things, the transition involved the adjustment of policy and strategy and possibly a rethinking of approaches as the government shifts from primarily supply-driven emergency and recovery assistance to sustainable development.

This paper sheds light on how to harvest the "youth dividend" in Sub-Saharan Africa by creating jobs in agriculture. The agriculture that attracts the youth will have to be profitable, competitive, and dynamic. These are the same characteristics needed for agriculture to deliver growth, to improve food security, and to preserve a fragile natural environment.

The agriculture sector has been and will continue to be important for poverty alleviation efforts in Indonesia. Indonesia was very successful in increasing agriculture productivity during the 1970s and up to the early 1990s, but productivity stagnated during most of the 1990s, partly as a result of declining public investments. Public spending on agriculture has increased significantly in the last decade, but a large share of that spending has been allocated to subsidizing private inputs.