ABSTRACT
This chapter derives a detailed rural profile of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) from a new and highly disaggregated data set based on a large number of recent country household surveys. Rural profile reveals the significantly greater poverty, income inequality and agricultural stagnation in SSA as compared with Asia and other parts of the developing world. The World Bank provides information on five sets of indicators summarizing returns from household surveys: demographic, education and literacy, head of household, household expenditure, and household amenities. The summary shows a fairly highly unequal distribution of income within the rural sector of SSA. Khan documented the stagnation of the rural sector in SSA and its dismal performance compared with other developing regions. The differences in cultural and community norms and customs between SSA and Asia and their impact on the divergent rural development paths followed by these two regions have been perceptively analysed by Platteau and Hayami.
