We can always help alleviate poverty, but its complete eradication is perhaps difficult, especially through agriculture alone, if not impossible, for many counts including inter alia:
i. Lack of distributive justice: People across the globe have unequal access to resources, including natural resources and access to opportunities that impact negatively on efforts to develop even societies.
ii. The inequities and inequalities in ranks of societies lead to unsustainable production & consumption that in turn set in a vicious circle of poverty, food insecurity, hunger & disease.
iii. One Size fit, exotic solutions offered by international players including the World Bank, IMF, WTO and others have led to lopsided development.
iv. Climate Change (CC) is further precipitating inequalities, as the poor are the one to bear the brunt of CC, being on front line.
We need to focus sharply at first instance to sustainable production and consumption, contain post-harvest losses, encouraging value added agriculture and promoting green technologies. Needless to mention that policy-deficit at global & national levels needs to be addressed and informed, evidence-based home-grown solutions need to be offered for poverty alleviation.
Dr. Wajid Pirzada