Executive Summary: "Myanmar is ready for change. This is particularly true of Myanmar?s rural sector, where 7 out of every 10 people live and most people in poverty reside. Over half are employed directly in agriculture, producing food for themselves, their communities, and for sale. Many others in rural areas ? often without their own land ? work hard in rural non-farm enterprises transporting produce, processing foods, and providing needed services. Others may migrate in search of work in Myanmar?s cities or abroad. Yet despite its location at the crossroads of the most economically dynamic region in the world, Myanmar has among the highest rates of poverty and malnutrition in the region. Myanmar?s Asian neighbors have shown that, in response to consumer demand for increasingly diversified diets as incomes and urbanization rise, investing in rural infrastructure and establishing policies to encourage their farmers to produce products that meet market needs will unleash a virtuous circle of growth among farmers, food processers, and service providers who are linked to growing urban centers and export markets. Raising productivity and diversifying from low-value grains into high-value meats, oilseeds, pulses, horticulture, and aquaculture stabilizes food expenditures for increasingly urban consumers, raises incomes for rural areas, and strengthens competiveness in regional and global markets. Among Asian neighbors, it has helped raise millions of rural people out of hunger and poverty. Myanmar is ready to seize that promise for its own future. Myanmar needs to break away from a legacy of policies that have held back, rather than stimulated, its farmers? potential. A mind-set change is needed to step out of the business-as-usual approach that focused on supply-led, yield increases and domestic food self-sufficiency. Agriculture policy needs to shift to an innovative vision that centers on a demand-led approach driven by domestic consumers and foreign markets with increased productivity throughout the sector. To succeed in practice, narrow silos of thinking and communication among the government, the private sector, and civil society should be broken down to encourage more harmonious and coordinated efforts. This new Vision is inherent in the title of this White Paper ? moving from rice bowl to a food basket for Myanmar and increasingly to the rest of Asia (and the world). The aim is to improve the incomes and livelihoods of rural communities while increasing the availability of more stable, diversified, and nutritious diets to consumers. This objective can be achieved by empowering smallholder farmers, equipping them with knowledge and technical inputs, and connecting them to urban and global markets. vi In place of a government-driven focus on crop production targets, the paper offers a concrete and systematic strategy for how Myanmar can modernize its agricultural and food sector. The strategy embraces market-oriented, private sector-led investment, innovation, and dynamism that is centered on small farmers throughout the country. It requires forward-looking and efficient government policies and institutional support with greater interaction among key stakeholders characterized by full transparency and accountability..."