Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action: A Transformation Is Happening

The World Economic Forum's 'New Vision for Agriculture' proposes a '20/20/20' goal: achieving 20% improvements per decade in economic growth, food security, and environmental sustainability. The report argues that this transformation requires a shift from philanthropic approaches to market-based investments, driven by six essential elements: leadership alignment, clear strategy, an investment pipeline, infrastructure development, catalytic financing, and robust delivery mechanisms. It highlights successful national initiatives in countries like Brazil, Morocco, Vietnam, and Tanzania as evidence that such systemic change is feasible through public-private collaboration.

• The 'New Vision for Agriculture' targets a 20% improvement per decade across three primary goals: economic growth and opportunity, food security and nutrition, and environmental sustainability.
• Global food production must increase by 70% to meet the demands of a growing and more affluent population, requiring investment increases of up to 50% in developing countries.
• Systemic agricultural transformation depends on six critical elements: leadership and stakeholder alignment, a clear strategy and priorities, a concrete investment and entrepreneurship pipeline, enabling hard and soft infrastructure, catalytic financing and risk management, and robust delivery and implementation mechanisms.
• Improving water productivity, or 'crop per drop', can address up to 80% of impending water scarcity in irrigation-intensive countries like India through better application efficiency and yield enhancement.
• The report identifies specific global indicators to track progress: rural income per capita for economic growth; global food production and malnutrition prevalence for food security; and greenhouse gas emissions and water use per tonne of production for environmental sustainability.
• Successful transformations shift the approach to agricultural development from philanthropy to market investment, incentivizing innovation and risk resilience.
• In Vietnam, the modernization of land rights and decollectivization of agriculture served as critical 'soft infrastructure' that enabled significant growth, including a 20-fold increase in coffee production from 1989 to 2009.
• Morocco's 'Plan Vert' utilized a 'nucleus farm/outgrower model' where sophisticated private farmers were given land leases in exchange for helping smallholders transition to high-value crops.
• Tanzania's Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor (SAGCOT) initiative aims to generate US$ 1.2 billion in farming revenue and create 420,000 new jobs, primarily for smallholders.
• Climate-related risks for smallholders, particularly in Ethiopia, are being addressed through innovative insurance and resilience programs like HARITA and R4, which combine microinsurance with community labor.

APA

World Economic Forum (n.d.). Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action: A Transformation Is Happening. http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_FB_NewVisionAgriculture_HappeningTransformation_Report_2012.pdf

Chicago

World Economic Forum. Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action: A Transformation Is Happening. n.d. http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_FB_NewVisionAgriculture_HappeningTransformation_Report_2012.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=World Economic Forum |title=Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action: A Transformation Is Happening |url=http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_FB_NewVisionAgriculture_HappeningTransformation_Report_2012.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{worldeconomicforumndputting, author = {{World Economic Forum}}, title = {{Putting the New Vision for Agriculture into Action: A Transformation Is Happening}}, institution = {World Economic Forum}, url = {http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_FB_NewVisionAgriculture_HappeningTransformation_Report_2012.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }