ABSTRACT

Over nearly two decades, North East (NE) Brazil and the World Bank have been engaged in an evolving experiment in participatory development to reduce rural poverty. From 1986 to the present, some US$1.4 billion have been invested in ten states which comprise the NE region, applying a methodology that has come to be defined as community-driven development (CDD). 2 In stark contrast to previous attempts at combating rural poverty in NE Brazil – particularly under the guise of earlier failed integrated rural development schemes – CDD relies on local knowledge and understanding to generate investment options to meet pressing community demands. Having started as an obscure sub-component of a larger set of fairly traditional rural development projects, CDD in NE Brazil has been incrementally modified and fine-tuned into what today arguably represents one of the more effective CDD country programs worldwide, in terms of both its ability to reach the rural poor with investment resources and to generate tangible benefits. Across four successive generations and a cumulative 36 projects, well over 50,000 small-scale community investments have been financed and implemented by some 36,000 community organizations, extending basic services such as rural electrification, safe water and income-generating activities to approximately 1.2 million households, or about seven million individuals.