Innovation takes place not only in laboratories, and disseminating knowledge need not depend on classrooms. The Cambodian GIZ project “Best Farmer 2012” is an example of how achievements of small-scale farmers can be appreciated and their co-farmers can simultaneously benefit from new insights.

The land reform process in Cambodia is full of examples of injustice and human rights violations. Promises to improve the situation of the landless and land-poor citizens have remained unfulfilled. Development co-operation efforts have not changed this either.

Sierra Leone is one of the least developed countries in the world and is still recovering from a civil war that ended in 2002. Increasingly, the Sierra Leonean government seeks to attract foreign investors through providing opportunities for large-scale land leases for the development of agribusiness. This has triggered a rapid transformation process that poses a considerable threat to food security and social stability. Despite being a pilot country for the implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure, there is no real change on the ground as yet.

In a long-term project in Kenya, the Swiss-based Research Institute of Organic Agriculture has examined the potential of organic and conventional agriculture regarding soil fertility, the occurrence of pests and diseases, and profitability. Initial results make a strong case to implement policy measures necessary for supporting the adoption of organic management practices on a large scale.

In September 2015, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are to be adopted in the context of the Post-2015 Agenda. In what way do the SDGs differ from the Millennium Development Goals? What does the community of states expect from their introduction? Our authors describe the background of the process and the latest developments in the debate.

The demand to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger has been the centrepiece of the Millennium Development Goals; the first MDG stands for the inextricable link between poverty and people’s ability to access safe, nutritious and sufficient food. How will the objective of achieving global food and nutrition security be embedded in the SDGs? Will the SDGs be a further step towards this target?

Does the inclusion of land rights in the global development agenda bear the potential to promote the secure and fair distribution of land rights? Yes, our author believes – provided that the land-rights community does not rest on its laurels and really addresses the crucial aspects.

On the 11th May 2012, the Committee on World Food Security of the United Nations adopted the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests (VGGT). Rural 21 asked Roman Herre of the human rights organisation FIAN about his views on the implementation of the Guidelines so far.

With reference to the “One World – No Hunger” Initiative, Stefan Schmitz shows how food policies can support the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals and highlights the interdependencies between the individual goals and targets.

Meant well doesn’t always mean done well. The Sustainable Development Goals are all set to undermine themselves, Stephan Klasen maintains. The worst aspect is that people, who really ought to be at the focus, threaten to fall by the wayside in this technocratic maze of hundreds of goals, targets, and indicators.

Is it right to attach financial values to nature and to incorporate that valuation into the post-2015 agenda? Will such valuation help to protect species diversity and ecosystems? Or does it not rather harbour the risk that we cheerfully go on destroying nature since other aspects of the national accounts can be seen as compensation? Civil society is split on this issue. Our author points out why.

More than 30 years ago, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) started a post-harvest programme in Central America named “Postcosecha”. The significant impact that was still evident long after the project end also continues to exist after the cessation of external support. The current priority in SDC’s contribution to post-harvest management (PHM) is to use existing knowledge and experience to create conditions for scaling up the most appropriate PHM technologies in sub-Saharan Africa.