ABSTRACT

The general conclusion to be drawn from this part of the study is that prominence should be given to the complementary development policy role to be played by African local authorities in the achievement of agriculturally based economic development. As some 80 per cent of the poor in sub-Saharan Africa live in rural areas, the gradual creation or the strengthening of developmentoriented community structures is an essential precondition for poverty reduction. Only through decentralized development, achieved on the basis of political, institutional and fiscal decentralization, can broad-based socio-economic development and processes of democratization from the bottom up take place simultaneously. Within this framework international measures in support of intersectoral development programmes can also be more effectively integrated in accordance with the principle of the graduated division of labour and responsibility for development between the local population, the private sector, the local authorities and central government.