The President of IFAD highlighted agriculture's potential as a tool for peace and hope during an interview with Vatican News. Approximately one-third of the global population relies on agriculture for their livelihood, yet many face food insecurity due to conflict and climate change. IFAD operates in 92 countries, focusing on projects that enhance prosperity, food security, and resilience for rural populations. IFAD distinguishes itself by making substantial investments and co-financing projects with governments, communities, and the private sector to ensure shared ownership.
about 2 months ago
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) operates in 92 countries to promote prosperity, food security, and resilience among rural populations.1
President Dr. Alvaro Lario stresses investing in the "first mile"—smallholder farmers—by providing access to inputs, technology, storage, markets, credit, insurance, water, soil, and seeds.1
IFAD co-finances projects with governments, communities, and the private sector to foster ownership.1
Around 2.5-2.6 billion people, or one-third of the global population, rely on agriculture for livelihoods, yet face food insecurity from conflict, climate change, and resource shortages.1
Eighty percent of extreme poverty exists in rural areas, which are often underinvested compared to urban sectors.1
Agriculture drives economic growth two to three times more effectively than other areas in agriculture-dependent communities.1
In Sudan, amid the world's worst humanitarian crisis, IFAD supports small farmers to enhance food security, incomes, and resilience.1
Dr. Lario links conflict to hunger and poverty, but views agriculture as a means to unite communities, broker peace, and instill hope.1
Local supply chains are vital to connect rural producers to regional and international markets.1
On January 15, 2026, Dr. Lario met Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican to discuss transforming rural lives and providing hope.1
They addressed IFAD's work in Peru, where the Pope served as bishop, noting farmers produce quality food but often fail to reap rewards.1
The Pope's voice helps spotlight crises like Sudan's.1
Agriculture’s role in fostering peace and hope
Catholic tradition consistently teaches that agriculture is not merely an economic activity but a vital pathway to human dignity, social justice, and lasting peace. By providing food security, fostering solidarity among nations, and stewarding creation, agriculture counters the roots of conflict—hunger, inequality, and environmental degradation—while sowing seeds of hope for future generations. Papal documents emphasize that just agricultural systems promote equitable access to land's fruits, enabling people to live with purpose and interdependence, as seen in repeated calls for international cooperation against poverty and malnutrition.
From the late 19th century onward, the Church's social magisterium has highlighted agriculture's role in addressing global inequalities that breed unrest. Pope John Paul II recalled how predecessors like Leo XIII, Pius XI, and Paul VI developed doctrines on labor-capital relations, extending them to rural development in encyclicals such as Rerum Novarum, Quadragesimo Anno, Mater et Magistra, Pacem in Terris, Populorum Progressio, and Octogesima Adveniens. These texts link agricultural progress to peace by urging fair systems where "labour and capital" balance yields human flourishing rather than exploitation.
Pope Paul VI, in addressing FAO, envisioned "a fertile land for all men," decrying how inventive skills often prioritize destruction over fertilizing idle lands or harnessing human energies. He called for transitioning from profit-driven economies to those serving the common good, mobilizing land and ocean resources so "every man can procure [daily bread] himself by his diligent work." Similarly, messages to the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) underscore agriculture's fight against hunger. Pope John Paul II praised IFAD's role in solidarity efforts, noting it empowers agricultural workers, fishermen, and ranchers lacking resources, affirming their dignity through productive work. Pope Benedict XVI echoed this, lauding IFAD's priority on development over aid, interest-free loans for the poorest, and linking poverty eradication to food security and job creation guided by gratuitousness.
These teachings reveal agriculture as a moral imperative: land, God's gift, must benefit all, not just a few, preventing "social sin" through omissions that exclude the poor from its fruits.
At agriculture's heart lies human labor, which the Church views as participation in God's creative act, instilling hope by restoring people from "less human conditions" to fuller lives. Pope John Paul II stressed "radical and urgent changes" to value agriculture as the "basis for a healthy economy," placing rural families at society's center. In his Mass for rural workers, he insisted that in every agricultural stage—from grower to consumer—"no one person... is greater than the other in the eyes of God," urging solidarity and reconciliation for solutions honoring dignity.
IFAD addresses resonate here: Pope John Paul II highlighted how it combats resignation among hunger-stricken populations, making individuals "responsible not for something, but for someone," the person needing bread. Benedict XVI noted IFAD's esteem for ethical principles like equal dignity, rekindling fraternity to make the world "more humane." This dignifies the rural poor, countering marginalization in Asia, Africa, and Latin America despite global food surpluses.
Peace blooms where hunger withers and creation thrives. Pope Leo XIV's messages tie agriculture to "unarmed and disarming" peace, urging synergy among religious leaders for the vulnerable, common home care, and human dignity—faith uniting, not dividing. At COP30, his message linked peacebuilding to creation stewardship: climate change, resource plundering threaten peace, demanding multilateralism centered on life's sacredness and common good, especially aiding vulnerable nations. Echoing John Paul II, it calls ecological crisis a "moral issue" needing solidarity between industrialized and developing worlds.
Pope Leo XIV's World Day of Prayer for Creation speaks of "seeds of peace and hope" in projects like Borgo Laudato Si’, applying Laudato Si’ for integral ecology—living, working, and building community sustainably. Pius XII and others connected migration rights to food access, as earth provides abundantly if justly shared. Rural stewardship ensures harvests for posterity, avoiding destruction through faithful care.
For Franciscans, agriculture embodies St. Francis's charism—poverty, peace, creation care. Pope Leo XIV's letter to Franciscan leaders invokes Francis as intercessor for "unarmed and disarming witnesses of the peace that comes from Christ," amid his eighth centenary. This aligns with agrarianism critiquing urbanism, urging temperance and rural centrality for justice.
Agriculture fosters peace by eradicating hunger's violence and hope by dignifying work and creation care. Papal voices—from Pius XII to Leo XIV—unite in calling for equitable systems, solidarity, and ecology as peace paths. In a world of conflicts and climate woes, Catholics must champion rural development, international funds like IFAD and FAO, and lifestyles mirroring divine generosity. Thus, beating "swords into plowshares" (Is 2:4) becomes reality, yielding justice, fraternity, and Christ's peace.