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Agriculture at a Crossroads: Synthesis Report of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science, and Technology for Development (IAASTD). Edited by B. D. McIntyre, H. R. Herren, J. Wakhungu and R. T. Watson. Washington, DC: Island Press (2008), pp. 95, US$20.00. ISBN 978-1-59726-550-8.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 October 2009

Amir Kassam
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Type
Book Review
Information
Experimental Agriculture , Volume 46 , Issue 1 , January 2010 , pp. 115 - 116
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

This cross-cutting Synthesis Report builds upon the Global and Sub-Global reports of IAASTD that provide evidence for the integrated analysis of the main concerns necessary to achieve development and sustainability goals. The first part of the Report identifies the current conditions, challenges and options for action that shape agricultural knowledge, science and technology (AKST), while the second part focuses on eight cross-cutting popular themes.

IAASTD responds to the realization that the significant scientific and technological achievement in our ability to increase agricultural productivity has come with some unacceptable social and environmental consequences. The IAASTD process concludes that given the challenges we confront today, the current AKST model required revision. Given that the mounting crisis in food security and sustainability is of a different complexity and potentially different magnitude to that of the 1960s, business as usual is no longer an option.

The IAASTD process makes a unique and significant contribution to our understanding of what has been going on in the AKST sector internationally during the recent decades. However, the proposed options for action would have been more convincing had the process been linked to the World Development Report 2008/09 process with which it overlapped. Equally, the AKST sector would have gained much from the IAASTD process if it had made an explicit scrutiny of the institutions and processes that are responsible for guarding and enhancing the relevance and quality of AKST for sustainable development and poverty alleviation. This not withstanding, the IAASTD Synthesis Report bodes well for a hoped-for greener world of tomorrow.