Agriculture

This report analyses the factors which motivate land use by rural populations and provides a context for any policy or strategy which addresses natural resource conservation in the Sahel. The author suggests that production systems in the Sahel have reached or even exceeded their capacity to respond to the needs of a growing population and further that development aid has only had a negligible impact on the trend to over exploit.

The entry into force of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture marks the commitment of the world community to a freestanding convention directed at addressing both global needs for food security and internationally agreed objectives regarding the concepts of "access and benefit-sharing" found in the Convention on Biological Diversity.