IFAD’s work focuses on poor rural people, including poor smallholder farmers, fishermen and pastoralists, as well as landless and indigenous people.
Its programmes aim at improving poor rural people's access to financial services, markets, technology, land and natural resources. As an international financial institution, IFAD provides grants and loans on favourable terms to countries affected by widespread rural poverty. IFAD also provides expertise in the agricultural sector and supports innovation.
IFAD: International Fund for Agricultural Development – Core Contribution
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is a specialised agency of the United Nations mandated to enable poor rural women and men to improve their food security and nutrition, raise their incomes and strengthen their resilience. Its mandate therefore dovetails with the priorities of Switzerland's development policy.
Topic | Period | Budget |
---|---|---|
Agriculture & food security Climate change and environment
Agricultural development
Agriculture value-chain development (til 2016) Environmental policy |
01.01.2016
- 31.12.2018 |
CHF 45’087’000
|
- Increased incomes and enhanced food security and nutrition for rural people served by IFAD-supported projects and programmes, equitably divided between men and women.
- Improved policy and regulatory frameworks for agriculture and rural development at local, national and international levels.
- Strengthened and inclusive rural producers’ organizations, benefiting men and women equally.
- Strengthened institutional capacity for pro-poor agriculture and rural development, in particular in fragile states.
- Smallholder agriculture better adapted to climate change and more effectively confronting environmental degradation.
- - More sustainable natural resources (soils, water, forests, plant and animal life).
- International Fund for Agricultural Development
-
Sector according to the OECD Developement Assistance Commitiee categorisation AGRICULTURE
OTHER MULTISECTOR
GENERAL ENVIRONMENT PROTECTION
Sub-Sector according to the OECD Developement Assistance Commitiee categorisation Agricultural development
Rural development
Environmental policy and administrative management
Cross-cutting topics The project promotes biodiversity.
The project takes account of gender equality as a cross-cutting theme.
The project takes account of democratisation, good governance and human rights as cross-cutting themes.
Aid Type Core contribution
Project number 7F03649
Area of responsibility |
IFAD is today the only multilateral organization with a mandate specialized on smallholder agriculture. It is a unique partnership of 176 members from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), other developing countries, and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). With more than 60 percent of members contributing to the Fund, IFAD’s sense of ownership is high, especially as compared to other financial instiutions. IFAD is one of the three UN Rome-based agencies specialized in food and agriculture. All three agencies have different but complementary mandates, with the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) playing an important role in developing norms and sharing knowledge on agriculture, and the WFP (World Food Programme) specialized in delivering food aid. As a fund, IFAD’s role is to mobilize resources to invest in development opportunities for poor rural people in the form of loans and grants to a country partners. With its focus on rural poverty eradication, IFAD has contributed to progress in the Millennium Development Goals number 1, 3 and 7 (eradicate extreme poverty, promote gender equality and empower women, and ensure environmental sustainability). The organization is well positioned to make a significant contribution to the Post-2015 Development Agenda, in particular Goal 2 “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture”, and in positioning smallholder farmers at the center of global efforts to strengthen food security. |
Switzerland's and the organisation's strategic priorities and their coherence |
IFAD is one of the 13 multilateral priority organizations of Switzerland in the Dispatch on International Cooperation 2013-2016, and is foreseen to remain a prioritiy organization in the Dispatch on International Cooperation 2017-2020. The clear mandate of IFAD on smallholder agriculture has enabled the organization to develop an expertise and proven results in areas of work that are central to the mandate of the Swiss development cooperation, namely poverty reduction and rural development. IFAD’s approach for the transformation of rural areas is fully in line with SDC’s, with a focus on inclusive value chains, sustainable increase of agricultural production and productivity, food security and nutrition, sustainable management of natural resources and climate change adaptation, empowerment of women, youth, and farmers’ organizations. IFAD’s commitment to identifying new sources of finance for rural development in the Post-2015 is also in line with the engagement of Switzerland in the financing for development global debate, and the need to establish some international funding mechanisms to ensure the realization of the Sustainable development Goals. |
Results of the organisation's previous engagement |
Operational model: IFAD has progressed steadily in its fundamental transition from a focus on financing individual projects to a programmatic approach that links knowledge work, policy dialogue and partnerships to projects in each country, with growing attention given to the scaling up agenda. Development outcomes and impact as defined in the Results Measurement Framework (RMF) 2013-2015: performance is high in terms of rural poverty impact, environment and natural resource management, gender equality, market development, replication and scaling up. For these indicators, performance is already close to or exceeding RMF targets set for 2015. Benchmarking performance: the performance of IFAD’s operations is generally on a par with the agriculture sector’s operations of the World Bank globally, similar to that of the African Development Bank in Africa, and better than the Asian Development Bank in Asia and the Pacific. Strengthening financial management capacity: IFAD has strengthened its financial operations department and its budget and organizational development unit. IFAD has implemented the new financial model using the sustainable cash flow approach, which has now become the framework for determining the Fund’s advance commitment capacity. Innovative financing: IFAD has signed an agreement with the Development Bank of Germany (KfW) for a sovereign loan up to a maximum of USD 500’000. This is regarded as a pilot and IFAD gained a lot in terms of negotiation skills in the preparation of this sovereign borrowing agreement. |
Results of Switzerland's engagement in previous phase |
Decentralisation: Switzerland has been influential in decentralisation policy since the onset of the process. With 40 country offices established during IFAD9, independent evaluations found that country presence has led to better programme performance and enhanced policy dialogue with partner governments. This has also helped to build more strategic partnerships at the country level, including through the United Nations “Delivering as One” agenda. IFAD has included a country’s fragility as one of the criteria in prioritizing the location of new country offices. Climate change adaptation: Switzerland has contributed to the Adaptation for smallholder agriculture programme (ASAP) with CHF10 million during IFAD9. Today, there are 43 ASAP investments in the pipeline, and 21 ASAP-supported projects with a budget of USD 191 million approved by the Executive Board. With USD 359 million in confirmed pledges from 10 bilateral donors, ASAP is today the single largest climate change initiative for smallholder farmers worldwide. |
Medium-term outcome of organisation's current engagement |
The development goal of IFAD10 is to enable 80 million rural people to move out of poverty for the period 2013-2018. The main targeted outcomes in support of this impact to be measured in the Results measurement framework 2016-2018 are as follows: All these outcomes will be underlined by four operational priorities: public-private-producer partnerships (4Ps), country-level policy engagement, global policy engagement, and South-South & Triangular cooperation. Three cross-cutting themes will continue to be mainstreamed during IFAD10: adaptation to climate change, improved nutritional impact and gender equality and women’s empowerment. IFAD will also develop a more differentiated approach for, and among, middle-income countries and for countries in fragile situations, to ensure that poor rural people are agents of change in the process of inclusive rural transformation. |
Effect in Switzerland |
Independent office of evaluation (IOE): Switzerland has a proven comparative advantage in influencing IFAD’s policies in evaluation. Switzerland will continue to actively engage with the IOE and reformulate the SDC-IOE partnership agreement in a strategic way to ensure that the Swiss support enables the IOE to “go the extra-mile” in terms of innovative activities in evaluation, whilst being in line with SDC’s good practice with other multilateral agencies. Public-private-producer partnerships (4Ps): Switzerland will engage in shaping IFAD’s engagement with the private sector on a more systematic basis, based on the establishment of inclusive value-chains with smallholder farmers. Switzerland will focus on the transformation of the business models of private sector companies for inclusive value chains, and on ensuring that these value chains have a net positive impact in terms of food security and nutrition. |
Directorate/federal office responsible |
SDC |
Credit area |
Development cooperation |
Project partners |
Contract partner United Nations Organization (UNO) |
Budget | Current phase Swiss budget CHF 45’087’000 Swiss disbursement to date CHF 45’086’305 Budget of the organisation CHF 3’600’000’000 |
Switzerland's ranking in the DonorOrder |
9th (to be confirmed based on final pledges submitted by August 2015 by all contributing member States). |
Donors |
Core contribution ranking: 1. United Kingdom, 2. USA, 3. Netherlands, and Switzerland 9. out of 107 donors. |
Coordination with other projects and actors |
Switzerland is a Member of List A (OECD countries) and an alternate Executive Board member for the period 2013-2017. Switzerland contributes actively to joint List A statements and positioning, and acts as a bridge-builder between the lists. |
Project phases |
Phase
13
01.01.2022
- 31.12.2024
(Current phase)
Phase 11 01.01.2016 - 31.12.2018 (Completed) Phase 10 01.01.2013 - 31.12.2015 (Completed) |
Themes
In its work, IFAD focuses on the following areas:
- Natural resources – land, water, energy and biodiversity
- Climate change adaptation and mitigation
- Improved agricultural technologies and effective production services
- A broad range of inclusive financial services
- Integration of poor rural people within value chains
- Rural enterprise development and non-farm employment opportunities
- Technical and vocational skills development
- Support to rural producers’ organisations
Results of new agricultural technologies and production services
In Asia and the Pacific, programmes supported by IFAD in 2012 helped 100,000 farmers adopt more efficient technologies. More than 90% of them subsequently reported higher yields. In Vietnam, for example, projects to raise productivity helped to improve food security in mountainous areas.
Rice production increased from 2 to 5 tonnes per hectare, and 3 tonnes of maize instead of 1 were harvested from the same land surface area.
Switzerland’s commitment
Switzerland’s priorities
As a member of and contributor to IFAD, Switzerland focuses in particular on the following issues:
- Strengthening IFAD’s role as a global facilitator and coordinator of efforts between governments, farmers’ organisations, women’s groups, the private sector, agricultural research institutions and other stakeholders, on behalf of the rural poor in developing countries.
- Supporting the progressive adaptation of IFAD’s operational model towards a decentralised organisation, in line with the reform of its human resources policy.
- Supporting an effective and efficient division of labour between IFAD’s Independent Office of Evaluation (IOE ) (responsible for carrying out independent evaluations of IFAD’s operations), the Evaluation Committee (responsible for supervising the IOE ’s work and providing guidance) and IFAD’s management (responsible for monitoring IFAD’s self-evaluation system), with a view to strengthening IFAD’s development effectiveness.
Switzerland is represented in the highest decision-making body, the Governing Council, and is also a member of the Executive Board for the years 2013 and 2014.
The Executive Board decides on the work programme and approves projects, programmes and grants.
Results: The "First Mile" project in Tanzania
Switzerland supported the "First Mile" project, which was launched as a learning initiative for local groups designed to make it easier for smallholder farmers to access the market. The project was implemented by the Swiss centre of excellence AGRIDEA with the help of the IFAD-supported Agricultural Marketing Systems Development Programme AMSDP. While the project ended in 2009, the resulting local networks of traders continue to provide improved market access services to smallholders in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda.
Challenges
The challenges faced by IFAD in its work include issues such as the need to continuously enhance country ownership of local projects in order to ensure the sustainability of programmes supported by IFAD. IFAD's efficiency and coordination with the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) also need to be continuously improved.