In the past some countries have concentrated on developing large-scale commercial agricultural production, much of it intended for export, reasoning that its success would have a multiplier effect on food production and help small-scale farmers, too. If anything, however, this strategy made life even harder for poor farmers by driving down prices and forcing many to sell land to bigger enterprises (11, 35, 99).

Use of new, improved varieties of crops—like other innovations such as family planning—becomes self-sustaining only if most people, and particularly opinion leaders and other influential community members, accept and adopt the new practices (123). New agricultural practices will be slow to spread unless they respond to local needs and unless farmers are involved in introducing them. For example, in Rwanda, women, not men cultivate beans. When plant breeders developed several higher-yielding, disease-resistant varieties of bush bean in the late 1970s, however, they worked with male farmers to introduce the varieties. A decade later only 10% of the beans being grown were the improved varieties. After extension agents began working with womenfarmers in the late 1980s, bean yields rose by as much as 40% (16).

In India geneticists from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) have designed a new drought-resistant variety of pearl millet, which is being tested in the state of Rajasthan. By working with local farmers to introduce the crop, rather than working only on experimental plots, ICRISAT staff have been able to speed up the adoption process. Radio and television have helped spread the word, and the new variety is being disseminated among farmers faster than ever before (99).