Rural non-farm employment and sustainable rural livelihood approaches: revising the toolkits

The lessening of rural poverty continues to be a paramount goal of the developing countries as the majority of their poor population still resides in the countryside. The World Bank, for example, estimates that more than 70 percent of the world’s poor reside in rural areas. So far, various strategies have been applied to address this concern, and among the major ones is rural employment creation. The agriculture sector has played a central role in providing rural employment opportunities in different countries. The sector, however, has been contending with a number of factors that have limited its further potential for generating new jobs in rural areas. Those factors include, for example, the small size of landholdings, insufficient capital and investment incentives, the inadequate farm infrastructure, limited markets, and stagnant prices of agricultural products. All of these have contributed to restricting the capacity for job creation in the agriculture sector. It is therefore necessary to focus on a broader spectrum of the rural economy, not just on agriculture. The aim of this paper is to make a systematic analysis of the role rural non-farm employment in creating conducive ground for sustainable livelihoods for the rural people. Various approaches and emerging issues on rural non-farm employment and sustainable livelihoods are systematically examined. The data was collected using secondary source of data, development and sociological literatures. The systematic and logical analysis of that has revealed that the rural non-farm employment is getting the attention of various international agencies, development scholars and policy makers as the increasing number of people are being engaged in the sector.