Abstract: With its emphasis on capacity building and Timorization, the Agricultural Division of the United Nations Transitional Administration for East Timor (UNTAET), like other embryonic government departments, was created from scratch out of the devastation of September 1999. This article seeks to explain the role of the World Bank in shaping the institutional environment in which independent Timor-Leste’s future Ministerio da Agricultura, Pescas e Florestas/ Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries would operate. As such, this article is concerned to examine the World Bank ethos, certain of its working assumptions, as well as operational modus vivendi as it related to the important agricultural sector, employing up to 70-80 percent of East Timorese. The author also expands upon his own role as UNTAET consultant in, first, mounting a public information campaign in the districts in relation to the World Bank asset restoration program, and second, in a volunteer capacity, offering certain solicited advice on development issues.

© 2003 Portuguese Studies Review. All rights reserved.