Roundup: UN agency proposes roadmap to end rural poverty in LDCs: report

A United Nations Conference Trade and Development (UNCTAD) report stressed on Wednesday the importance of increasing infrastructure investment and agricultural productivity while promoting non-farm activities in the world's Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

In the report, Entitled the Least Developed Countries Report 2015: Transforming Rural Economies, the UNCTAD proposes a new roadmap to address both rural poverty and the lack of progress in rural transformation which are the root causes of migration within and from LDCs.

This poverty driven migration can be problematic as it causes excessive rates of urbanization in LDCs. The report's recommendations seek to curb this process by focusing on poverty reduction "to create the conditions for a rural-urban migration process driven primarily by choice rather than necessity."

"In many least developed countries, migration is triggered by rural poverty, reflecting the lack of economic opportunities to earn even a minimally adequate income," UNCTAD Secretary-General Mukhisa Kituyi said at the report's launch.

"There can be no sustainable solution to the migration crisis without a poverty eradication-oriented approach to transforming rural economies in these countries," he added.

Strengthening agricultural research, development and extension services, together with supporting the expansion of dynamic enterprises that generate productive and well-paid employment while ensuring that finance for productive investment is not only available but affordable, were considered as pivotal points by the UNCTAD.

The UN agency also underlined the importance of adult education and schooling for children, gender-specific measures to address disadvantages, adapting policies to local realities and efficient coordination of rural development at the national level.

UNCTAD's report furthermore underlined the central role played by rural development in the global community's ability to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

One of the SDGs' main objectives is to end poverty in all its forms by 2030, a considerable challenge given that over two-thirds of LDCs' populations live in rural areas where poverty is twice as common as in towns or cities.

According to the report, to achieve this goal would require doubling the estimated income per capita in the world's poorest households in just 15 years, with figures showing that current levels have remained stagnant over the last three decades.

Universal access to water, sanitation, electricity and education will also require a "quantum leap" in the rate of infrastructure investment, the UNCATD indicated.

Out of the 48 countries currently considered by the UN as LDCs, only 8 were on track to half poverty between 1990 and 2015, while poverty has increased in seven since 1990. Endit