Right Target, Wrong Mechanism? Agricultural Modernization and Poverty Reduction in Uganda

Household consumption surveys suggest that the downward trend in rural poverty indicators recorded in Uganda during the 1990s has been reversed since 2000. This paper examines the Ugandan government's strategy to reduce rural poverty, the Plan for Modernization of Agriculture (PMA). It argues that, while there appear few better choices of “target” for the PMA than to improve incomes of the rural poor through increased agricultural productivity, emphasis on decentralization as a mechanism for poverty reduction is misplaced in the current political context of Uganda. The paper considers what alternative mechanisms might better deliver reductions in rural poverty.