| In most developing countries, many marginalized people have suffered from hunger even though most of them engage in agricultural production. Zambia, which is located in southern Africa, finds itself in the same situation in which many people who work in agriculture have been threatened by famine. Although many governments, multilateral organizations, and non-governmental organizations have conducted development projects up to now, few of the projects have reached out to marginalized people and have tried to help their development. In recent decades, the concept of sustainability has begun to interest by organizations conducting foreign development assistance programs, and it seems that sustainability may be the key to help the marginalized people. However, the concept of sustainability is vague and complex; for example, while one definition of sustainability means environmental sustainability, another means sustaining economic growth.;In this thesis, I explored what sustainable development is, and how sustainable agriculture contributes to maintain sustainable development. In addition, as a case study of a sustainable development project using sustainable agriculture, I studied the case of Zambian women farmers' cooperatives in terms of livelihood analysis and social capital development. Although the project, which provided knowledge of seed saving, seemed to positively affect Zambian women farmers' livelihood, many of the farmers still purchased seeds. According to the analysis of their social capital, a weak connection among the farmers may affect the knowledge diffusion of the methods of sustainable agriculture. |
