Over the past few decades, the status of rural and agricultural development has been steadily downgraded, both in developing countries' government budgets and in bilateral and multilateral development cooperation. The reason for this, in no small part, was that the funded measures often failed to produce the desired success. The article gives an overview of the conceptual approaches of past support strategies and the lessons learned, and goes on to make recommendations for a reorientation of policy on rural regions. 

Hans-Joachim Preuß
Managing Director
Hans-Joachim.Preuss@gtz.de

Albert Engel
Head: Agriculture, Fishery, Food Unit
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH
Eschborn, Germany
Albert.Engel@gtz.de