Agriculture : Toward 2000.

The structure of the report is simple. Fol lowing explanatory notes and an executive sta tistical summary, setting out a number of key assumptions and results of the study, the first part looks briefly backward. No apology is offered for doing so in a report on the future: the past performance of the food and agricultural sector and its present situation are the starting points for the many changes required to be made in the future.

The second part begins with a chapter which traces some possible outcomes of the continuation of present trends. While some overall indicators show significant improve ment, progress would be very uneven among countries and regions, perpetuating and intensi fying existing problems. Except in the more prosperous developing countries, there would be little or no improvement, and some countries would suffer a grave deterioration of their situa tion in such key areas as nutrition or dependence on food imports, the poorest among them, many in Africa, being affected most severely. The report then turns in Chapter 3 to ex amining and quantifying alternative improved paths of change. The emphasis is placed mainly on the developing countries, but the analysis of their perspectives is linked to those of the devel oped countries. It is feasible to improve signifi cantly on past trends in agriculture, particularly in the poorer among the developing countries, provided appropriate policies are pursued vigor ously and there is a reasonable degree of civil stability and effective administration. However, dependence on food imports from the devel oped countries (especially North America) would continue and rise further. The incidence of under-nutrition could be reduced significant ly, though hunger will not be eliminated in this century without policies specifically aimed at helping the poor.

Following the presentation of these scenar ios, Chapters 4 to 6 turn to the core of the study. the policies and measures which FAO thinks are needed to bring about the improvements postulated in the "better" scenarios. Chapter 4 emphasizes the inescapable necessity of modernizing agricultural production processes in the developing countries. Inputs to production of many kinds, both capital and current, must rise faster than output itself, and the use of ener gy, particularly in the form of fertilizers, must be expanded considerably. Chapter 5 proposes policies and measures to raise the efficiency and equity of agricultural structures and the in stitutions serving them, and to ensure that farm ers are given incentives to increase production. It emphasizes the need to improve access to land and other production resources and, at the same time, to increase the ability of poor people, rural and urban, to buy the food they need.

These discussions of national policies are followed in Chapter 6 by a consideration of complementary international action to reinforce them. The international framework for agricul ture must also be brought up to date in a num ber of respects: in addition to an expansion of direct assistance, trade must be encouraged to change to take more account of changing glob al patterns of demand and production possibil ities, and there is need and scope for improve ments in other linkages between countries that affect agriculture and world food security.

The third part, Chapter 7, presents an over view. It looks at the analyses of the earlier chap ters, then brings together, necessarily briefly, the main threads of the strategy of development which the study proposes, and concludes with a short quantified perspective of the longer-term future to the middle of the 21st century. In view of the enormous increases in production which will be required between 2000 and 2050, it is all the more imperative that the technical and socio-economic structure of farming in the developing countries be transformed within the next two decades. The study thus provides a reconnaissance of the future. Its major finding is challenging: over the next two decades the developing coun tries could double their food and agricultural production, but while this would certainly improve the nutrition of their people it would not. by itself, end the scourge of hunger. The essen tial prerequisite - improved food production - must go hand in hand with a more equitable dis tribution of this larger output. The study brings out that what is needed is a sustained effort on many fronts: no new startling technological breakthrough can be relied upon to transform production, there are no painless short-cuts to more equitable distribution of income and food supplies, and the development process must encompass both industrialization and agricul tural growth.