In the process of facilitating post-independence economic transition in Moldova, IFAD provided relevant and timely interventions in identified bottleneck areas of rural business development. The project performance assessment of the Rural Business Development Programme in Moldova increased the access of rural entrepreneurs to finance, facilitated business growth of enterprises along selected commodity chains and built small-scale infrastructure for rural businesses. The most important lesson learned from the programme is related to the challenges in ensuring the poverty reduction effect of rural enterprise development. The programme did not include poverty reduction goals, nor did it explicitly target poor households in economic activities or monitor the spill-over effect of rural enterprise development in benefitting or possibly affecting the rural poor. Income changes of households below the poverty line were not sufficiently monitored, which undermined the programme’s achievements.