How has agriculture changed in the past two decades?

What are the important new challenges and opportunities for agriculture?

How can agriculture be made more effective for poverty reduction?

According to the 2008 World Development Report (WDR), these crucial questions and several more can be answered with the help of GIS.

Published annually by the World Bank, the WDR focuses on topics such as the role of government, labor, health, and the environment to provide an in depth analysis on a specific aspect of development. In 2008, the report focuses on Agriculture for Development, and for good reason. As the natural resources that sustain agriculture become increasingly sparse, the World Bank expects that the global demand for food will double within the next 50 years.

This expectation and demand is a world-wide burden, but one that the WDR believes can be lifted partially by GIS. Throughout the WDR's 11 chapters, GIS is referenced in six of them, and is promoted as an innovative technology required for developing many strategies, including

  • Determining the spatial distribution of rural poverty in relation to agriculture
  • Creating new collaboration between scientists, policy makers, and farmers
  • Improving the practice of precision farming
  • Identifying areas that can absorb higher livestock densities
  • Filling the institutional vacuum in pasture management
  • Monitoring carbon emissions  

With the last WDR focusing on agriculture published 25 years ago, the World Bank is using GIS to restrategize agriculture's role in sustainable development and poverty reduction. For more information on the 2008 WDR and how it suggests that GIS can provide new resources for resolving the complex problems of sustaining and developing agriculture, visit www.worldbank.org/wdr2008