Unleashing rural development through productive employment and decent work: Building on 40 years of ILO work in rural areas

Pointing to an opportunity for stronger ILO work in rural areas, this paper reviews the main elements and lessons from the ILO’s considerable work on rural development in the past 40 years, including its identification of important gaps in coverage and barriers to ratification and implementation of labour standards. Based on this and on the 2008 ILC conclusions on promoting rural employment for poverty reduction, it proposes a strategy that combines shared responsibility for rural work Organization-wide, and mechanisms to facilitate coordination and synergies.