Many rural households indulge in piecework to supplement their incomes.

Only a minority of Ethiopians are born in hospitals most of them are born in rural households.

The incidence of poverty is higher in rural than in urban areas (54 per cent of rural and 30 per cent of urban households can be classified as poor).

89 per cent of rural households and use kerosene lamps for light.

Households can keep this entitlement for the term of the lease (now 30 years), but they do not have a property right in the land itself.

Table 18 Poverty structure of households in rural areas, by sex of head of household

In rural areas, almost 19 per cent of households are headed by women.

In the 1980s China introduced a one child policy that restricts many couples from having more than one child with several exceptions for rural couples, people without siblings, and others.

In rural areas, most sanitation investment, usually for latrines or septic tanks, is undertaken by individual households.

They may even transfer the lease to other farm households if their members find better jobs in the cities.

The HIV AIDS pandemic has had other wide ranging effects on households in rural areas.

Though farm collectives have remained the owners of rural land, households may obtain all residuals of their production, which creates the necessary incentive to use land productively.

In West Malaysia, 90 of all households earning less than M 100 a month were located in rural areas.

The HIV AIDS pandemic has had a dramatic impact on household structures and composition in rural areas.

The increase was more pronounced among the non indigent poor than among the non poor (except in rural areas of the Pacific region, where it declined among the non indigent poor but increased among the non poor).

As a result, yields are generally too low to allow the millions of rural households to generate marketable surpluses.

Over 50 of all households in Botswana own cattle, which is currently the largest single source of rural income.

In single households or households otherwise characterized by the absence of a male household member, rural women often assume all tasks and responsibilities, which can be an empowering experience for them.

First, rural households would be encouraged to have fewer children, and to invest more in each child s health and education. Child survival rates would rise, reinforcing lower fertility rates.

Senegal commemorated the International Day of Families in 2004 around the theme Family and poverty , discussing and addressing ways to decrease poverty among families but also highlighting the challenges that exist when approximately 50 per cent of urban families and nearly 75 per cent of rural families are living in poverty.

The Renewable Energy Policy Network for the Twenty First Century (REN21) estimates that there are tens of millions of rural households served by renewable energy around the globe.

China s entire reform process started with the adoption of the so called rural household contract system, which leases productive land to farm households.

Breaks in the drinking water supply are faced by 41.6 per cent of households (42.2 per cent in urban and 41.1 per cent in rural areas).

Individual and household access remains out of reach in the vast majority of rural and disadvantaged communities, in particular for women.

In extended families, or in more or less nuclear families, in monogamies or polygamies, in the cities or in the countryside's, in all of these relationships, women occupy a position of subservience and are subject to different forms that assume the form of discrimination according to age and the degree of wealth.

Families in some rural communities of Honduras, Nicaragua, and Mexico get monthly cash payments if their children s school attendance rates are 85 or higher.

The small piece of land allocated under the rural household contract system may not make farmers rich, but it serves as a social safety net of last resort.

Major challenges at present are the ratio of poor households remains high mainly in the rural, upland and ethnic minority areas which are faced with economic and social difficulties.

Despite efforts to diversify, most households in rural areas still depend on land and natural resources for their basic subsistence.

While the majority of family remittances will always be used to meet immediate needs, IFAD s experience shows that rural families would seize opportunities to save and invest, even small amounts, if they had better options.

People often attribute this to China s hukou, or household registration system, which separates the urban privileged and the rural poor from the start of their lives.

The Committee is concerned about the lack of direct access to safe drinking water in 17.5 per cent of rural households in Serbia and about the poor quality of water in central Serbia.

It was noticed that, even before the war, in rural areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bihać region, East Bosnia) that female pupils leave primary schools in order for the reason of their occupation in agriculture and households.

She recommended that the Government should immediately hold national consultations with women from all walks of life, including women from rural households, indigenous women and medical personnel, to find solutions to that problem.

This is particularly the case at the household and individual user level, but even small enterprises in rural areas often access computers in local village community centres and similar public places.

The Committee urges that the State party continue to develop the health system, ensuring the provision of the highest standard of health for all children, paying special attention to children in rural and geographically remote areas as well as those belonging to low income families.

Strengthening families

Family poverty.

A solar home system connects a photovoltaic panel to florescent lightbulbs, radio, and even TV, via a battery and load controller. A World Bank study has shown that a 20 watt solar home system can cut monthly kerosene consumption in rural households by roughly 15 liters.

This programme provides effective social safety net to 1.25 million poorest of the poor households, designed to meet basic nutritional requirements of the poor, covers urban as well as rural areas, recognises women as far as possible as the beneficiary in the household.

(Rural Women)

Loosing families and homes

Urban household spending in Africa is increasing twice as fast as rural spending, with urban per capita incomes, on average, 80 higher than those of countries as a whole.

IFAD has been working in more than 40 countries to ensure that rural families can have easy access to remittances, and are better able to use them as savings or investments that go back into their communities.

Rural and agricultural development