Towards new partnerships with farmers' organizations

A goal of IFAD is "to enable the rural poor and their organizations to influence institutions including policies, laws and regulations of relevance to rural poverty reduction". Strengthening the capacity of these organizations is currently one of our three strategic objectives. For IFAD, the empowerment of poor rural people is both a means to an end and an end in itself.

Smallholders and other resource poor agricultural producers constitute the overwhelming majority of the rural poor and of IFAD's target group. Smallholder farmers' organizations are, therefore, strategic partners for IFAD. Not as project beneficiaries but as institutions that deliver services to their members, speak on their behalf and are becoming key actors in social and policy dialogue at local, national and international levels.

From the very beginning of its operations, IFAD has been working with grassroots farmers' groups and community-based organizations in most of its projects and field level operations. As IFAD engagement in policy dialogue is growing, its interest in partnering with national and international farmers' organisations is also growing. Recently, IFAD supported engagement of farmers' organisations in regional policy development processes, such as The New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) or Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR).

There is a shared recognition, among IFAD staff, that more could be done jointly with farmers' organizations and that IFAD could contribute to strengthening their role in development, particularly, in discussing and shaping agricultural and rural development policy. This recognition is accompanied by the necessity to better understand the constituency and representativeness of existing organisations and their accountability to their membership. Most importantly IFAD needs to know the extent to which these organizations also represent the interests of the poorest rural producers.

The Policy Forum took advantage of the presence in Rome of representatives of eight national and international farmers' organizations, including the International Federation of Agricultural Producers, Via Campesina and ROPPA (West African network of farmers organisations), to start a process of reflection on our future collaboration and partnerships with farmers' organizations.

The purpose of the Forum is to exchange ideas as to the domains and directions of such future partnerships at the country, regional and global levels.

IFAD staff and farmers organisation representatives had the opportunity to better know each other and to share their respective ideas and expectations.

Discussion were organized along two broad areas:

• involvement of farmers' organizations in the articulation of IFAD country strategies (COSOP) and in the design and implementation of country programmes and projects;
• capacity building of farmers' organizations for participation in policy processes at national, regional and global levels.

A section of the discussion was devoted to the proposal of establishing a "Farmer's Forum" as a permanent feature of the IFAD Governing Council, starting in 2006. The next meeting of the Governing Council in February 2005 would host a side event to prepare a detailed proposal on the objective and modus operandi of such a Farmer's Forum.

During these presentations, all organizations advanced the importance of the concept of “food sovereignty” defined as “the right of peoples, communities and countries to define their own agricultural, labor, fishing, food and land policies which are ecologically, socially, economically and culturally appropriate to their unique circumstances.”

Issues deemed critical for rural poverty reduction by all of the farmers’ representatives were:

1. access to land and the need for redistributive agrarian reform (with the recognition, however, that this does not apply to all local/national realities where secure access might be promoted by different institutional arrangements)
2. recognition of, and support to, family agriculture as a guiding principle for policy decision making and policy dialogue
3. imperative to raise awareness among poor rural people and their understanding of implications of national/international policies and actions
4. international trade agreements and access to markets
5. threats associated with the interests and actions of transnational corporations in developing countries (seeds, labor laws/rights, use/purchase of land, etc.)

The recommendations advanced to IFAD were:

1. concentrate at the grassroots – consult with farmers and jointly develop strategies and programmes to bring them to the national, regional and international levels
2. engage active involvement of farmers’ organization in the articulation of COSOPs
3. internalize capacity building of organizations into the COSOPs
4. do not discuss and negotiate only with government (Ministry of Agriculture), but also with farmers’ organizations
5. yet, build capacity of government civil servants
6. recognize the existence and role of farmers’ organizations and build their capacity
7. put in place mechanisms to disseminate relevant information ( on inputs, prices, markets, etc.) so that farmers’ can make informed decisions
8. organization of an eventual farmers’ forum should start at the local level - it should be based on preparatory activities that empower farmers to meet and discuss at the local level on the issues that should be brought to the Forum

Main expectations from IFAD were:

1. sharing ofIFAD’s micro and impact analyses, especially in connection to the implications of (national/international) macro policies at the local/national levels. This would have an immediate empowerment effect for the farmers’ movements
2. sharing of IFAD’s assessments of development models implemented at the local level
3. facilitate and support organizations to influence national governments

The discussion revolved around a number of themes that would need to be discussed with farmers’ organizations to facilitate IFAD’s efforts to expand the scope and extent of its partnerships with these organizations.

In the process of expanding said partnerships, IFAD most likely will not face difficulties while working with local level organizations. It will do so, however, at higher levels. There, identification of joint agendas, given diversity of farmers and diversity of interests, the inevitable contradictions and complexities, might prove more problematic. In addition, apex organizations have themselves difficulties linking with the grassroots level. At the grassroots, evidence creates consensus. At higher levels, the margin for interpretation grows. One issue on which to consult with farmer leaders might be precisely this: how to collaborate with organizations of different levels and interests and how to get the necessary information as to the universe of existing organizations and which are the most relevant to work with in pursued of rural poverty reduction.

Another issue of concern is that of representativeness. IFAD would like to consult with farmers’ organizations to reach a common understanding as to the criteria that would better assess the representativeness of local/national organizations and regional/international networks.

IFAD will need to develop mechanisms not simply for itself to interact with farmers’ organizations, but also in order to facilitate interaction among farmers’ organizations from both the South and the North.

The importance of building alliances around shared visions and shared “understandings” as to development models and paradigms was stressed.

Next steps

It was agreed to proceed with the organization of a side event at IFAD's Governing Council that would bring together a number of farmers’ organizations and other representatives from civil society to discuss and make recommendations as to the format and contents of an eventual Farmers’ Forum in parallel with the Governing Council to be launched at the 2006 Governing Council.