ABSTRACT
Development has always been debilitated by fragmentation of effort and thought. Those working in agricultural development have long assumed that major advances in productivity and net farm income, for example, are a sufficiently powerful "engine of change" to set the whole rural development process in motion. Equally significant, private and public investors in rurally sited agricultural or agro-industrial enterprises are generally the pioneers of change. The following series of action recommendations are directed simultaneously to agribusiness, host governments, and donor countries. A major multinational agribusiness corporation from the United States has offered the site on a new venture in Central America for consideration. Agribusiness has invested literally billions of dollars in enterprises scattered into every corner of the earth. Too many bureaucrats and technical experts remain out of touch with their rural constituencies. Relative to money, in the case of aid agencies and host governments, the issue is an absolute lack than it is one of attitude toward the investment.
