The president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has recently called for greater support to Africa’s small family farmers as a key to eradicating extreme poverty and hunger on the continent.

“There are 500 million smallholder family farms in the world providing food and livelihoods for billions of people,” IFAD president Kanayo F. Nwanze said in an address to a conference sponsored by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) recently, saying “investing in the resilience of smallholder farmers is also investing in the resilience of food systems, the resilience of communities, and the strength of nations.”

Studies consistently show that economic growth in agriculture is significantly more effective in reducing poverty than growth generated by any other sector, Nwanze pointed out in his speech.

The IFPRI conference, titled “Building Resilience for Food and Nutrition Security,” brings together leading agricultural experts and policy-makers to discuss ways to boost farm productivity and improve livelihoods in low-income rural communities worldwide. Among the other featured speakers at the recent IFPRI forum were Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn, IFPRI director-general, Shenggen Fan, World Food Programme executive director, Ertharin Cousin, and Global Environmental Facility CEO, Naoko Ishii.

Small farmers in Africa today face increasing risks from climate change, Nwanze emphasised in his remarks. He noted that IFAD’s “ASAP” initiative – the Adaptation for Smallholder Agricultural Program – was providing needed credit and technical help to help small farmers adjust to temperatures and extreme weather patterns, yet much more assistance of this kind is needed throughout Africa.

Family farms are small businesses and should be treated as such, Nwanze stressed. “Poor rural people are not looking for charity,” he said. “Handouts do not build resilience; they increase dependency.”?

Africa’s agricultural sector generates about a third of the continent’s economic output and provides three-quarters of its jobs, mostly from small family farms, by IFAD estimates. Yet Africa has some 60 percent of the world’s uncultivated arable land, with the potential of becoming not only self-sufficient in food but a major net exporter, experts say.

Providing sufficient credit, marketing and technical support for small farmers is essential if the international community is to achieve the goal of eliminating famines and chronic hunger in Africa and elsewhere in the world, IFAD project reports show. IFAD has joined the other Rome-based UN agencies – the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP) – in calling for the inclusion of a “zero hunger” pledge in the post-2015 global development agenda, now under discussion at the UN for adoption by the General Assembly next year. 2014 is a pivotal year for accelerating progress on food security and poverty eradication, IFAD’s president told the Addis gathering.

“This is the African Union’s Year of Agriculture and Food Security. It is the International Year of Family Farming. And it is also the year when we are solidifying the post-2015 Agenda,” he noted. “Agriculture and rural development are essential for building resilient food and nutrition security. They provide a pathway to employment, wealth creation and economic growth.”