Ocampo Presents Report on Rural Development to Colombia’s President
On December 3, 2015, Professor José Antonio Ocampo will present to President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia the report of a Presidential Commission on Rural Development (Comisión para la Transformación del Campo).
The Commission was led by Professor Ocampo and included three members of the current government—the Minister of Agriculture, the Director of National Planning and the Director of Social Prosperity—as well as several former ministers, national and international academic experts, and representatives from business and agricultural associations.
A central element of the report is that it deals with how to implement the first of the Havana Peace Agreements between the government of Colombia and the major guerrilla group known as FARC (the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, colloquially known as the People's Army). Indeed, this is the only economic issue in the negotiations.
The report presents an integrated rural development plan for Colombia, with a target year 2030 to match the Sustainable Development Goals approved by the United Nations in September.
The plan, based on the need to respond to the diversity of the conditions in rural development areas and the need to promote widespread participation of society in the process of peacebuilding, includes proposals in six areas:
- elimination of rural-urban gaps in basic social services;
- promotion of family agriculture and small-scale non-agricultural activities;
- measures to increase the competitiveness of the agricultural sector;
- environmental sustainability, including the end of deforestation;
- integrated local rural development programs; and
- institutional reforms.
The short report, full report, and background studies (all in Spanish) may be downloaded from the website of the National Planning Department.