Following the decision of UNIDO’s commitment to rural development and poverty
reduction in Africa in the form of a One-Village-One-Product (OVOP)-type project, a
need arose to investigate the apparently spontaneous and idiosyncratic movement of the
OVOP activities in Oita and conceptualize it by taking into consideration the OVOP
experiences in developing countries. It is hoped that the conceptualization will help
practitioners to understand the key ingredients of OVOP activities and formulate an
OVOP “project” based on the seemingly uncoordinated OVOP “movement”. It is also
hoped that the underlying rationale of OVOP activities will become apparent and a basic
framework applicable to developing countries can be established. Finally, based on the
analysis, the report provides recommendations for the UNIDO project team, with
respect to the development of UNIDO’s own approach for an OVOP-type project.