In developing countries, increased food production will be achieved by cultivating marginal and fragile lands. Degraded lands, from moderate to highly degraded status, make up to 50% of the world’s land. Land degradation, desertification and drought affect more than 1.5 billion people in 110 countries, 90% of whom live
in low-income areas. The majority of agricultural land in developing countries is low productivity land. Much of this land faces the additional challenges of salinity, drought, poor soils, and continuous pest and disease pressure as well as the added hindrance of remoteness from markets. Production on these marginal and degraded lands is therefore highly variable and highly vulnerable. The new strategy follows the recommendation of the ISPC and focuses our work on farmers who practise “farming as a business”. These farmers are mainly smallholders in most of Africa and Asia. In Asia, farm sizes will increase as rural populations decline; in sub-Saharan Africa, farm sizes will continue decreasing into the next decades.