Listen to the entirety of World Bank President Robert McNamara's address to the Board of Governors at the 1973 Annual General Meeting in Nairobi, Kenya. In this famous speech, McNamara proposed a strategy for rural development with an emphasis on productivity of smallholder agriculture. He warned that official development assistance (ODA) is inadequate, and that over 800 million people live in absolute poverty. In the five years immediately following this speech, Bank Group financing of development efforts increased by over 40%.
