Resource information
The goal of this report is to take stock
of the existing evidence on the impact of the Comprehensive
Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) on poverty, to examine the
current challenges that an extension of CARP would face, and
to suggest directions toward achieving progress on land
reform given the financial and policy constraints faced by
the program. The report starts by examining the nature and
relevance of the challenges that an extension of the land
reform program will face. It then addresses the role of land
reform in rural development and poverty reduction. The
impact of agrarian reform on land markets, access to credit
and, more broadly, on the competitiveness of small farms is
then examined, separating the case of rice and corn lands
from that of sugarcane plantations, the latter taken as an
important 'case-study' of the broader plantation
sector. Implications for redesigning the program are then
drawn, focusing in particular on the need to more closely
involve important actors in the current process of rural
development. The report finally considers the institutional
changes that will be required.
