Agricultural growth is critical to achieving the MDGs. As the vast majority of poor people depend on agriculture for a living, higher agricultural productivity is a precondition for eradicating extreme poverty and hunger.

To a large extent, poverty is the result of unproductive agriculture, as the poorest countries in the world are also those in which agriculture employs the most people. Over 60 percent of people living on less than one dollar a day live in rural areas. Small farmers and herders continue to dominate the rural sector in most developing countries. Smallholders' chances of rising out of poverty depend directly on their ability to increase the productivity of their crop and livestock husbandry activities.

Agricultural growth depends on a combination of factors including farm productivity, access to markets, appropriate infrastructure, supportive policies, the application of agricultural research, and the availability of new technologies. Research offers small farmers improvements in crop varieties, farming practices, natural resource management and animal husbandry. When combined with sound policies, these advances create wealth for farmers and, when applied in combination with other key factors, spur growth across the agricultural sector.