Small-scale farmers often lack basic necessities such as access to fertile land, water, credit, knowledge, and extension services. Climate change and increasingly erratic weather patterns are compounding these problems, disrupting agriculture and food supplies, and making small-scale farming in many regions harder and more precarious.

Women, who grow much of the world's food, face some of the biggest hurdles of all. Women do not receive the same support as men farmers do. They have less access to land, loans and machinery. Many women work the land or are employed in informal, casual work, so when things go wrong, they are the first to lose their jobs and go without when household budgets shrink.

Malnutrition, disease, chronic rural poverty, and stunted economic development result when small farmers cannot earn decent livelihoods.

Emergency food and sustainable livelihood programming underpin many of our poverty-fighting development projects.