IFAD's flagship publication looks at rural poverty today, and it seeks solutions that will enable rural people overcome poverty in a rapidly changing world. It is intended to inspire policy makers and practitioners, especially those in developing countries, with an improved understanding of how to create the conditions for reducing rural poverty today, and with new ideas about the options going forwards. The report takes as its entry point poor rural people in the developing world. It focuses on their livelihoods, the constraints they face and the opportunities open to them, and it seeks to identify a series of routes that they can take to climb out of poverty.