This textbook summarises the main issues in contemporary rural development theory and practice to intermediate and advanced student level. It reviews key debates and issues, and explores the specific challenges for particular agricultural production systems. The main focus is on Asia and Africa, the areas of greatest rural poverty, with additional attention to Latin America as appropriate.


A key theme is the problem of poverty, which is predominantly a rural issue. It links this to rural livelihoods, and examines the major food production systems across the developing world or `global south', including livestock and various cropping systems in agriculture, as well as agroforestry, forests, fisheries and pastoralism. A major feature of the book is its inter-disciplinary approach and combination of the natural science of resources and agricultural and food production systems, with social science analyses of issues such as justice, equity, food security, governance, market access and economics. This provides a unique synthesis to demonstrate the range of factors upon which rural livelihoods depend.