IFAD 06/08

IFAD and the Government of Canada have signed a two-year CAD$1 million grant agreement for projects to improve empower poor rural women to reduce their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.

The Partnership Arrangement, issued through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), aims to promote an environment conducive to improving women’s economic empowerment and their access to legal, property and inheritance rights.  
  
An internal bidding process is currently under way that will grant approval for initiatives that focus on the following main themes: legal awareness and empowerment of rural women, policy dialogue to ensure gender equality, economic empowerment of rural women and knowledge management activities. The programme will be concluded by a workshop on the lessons learned. Priority will be given for projects in Africa.

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IFAD was created 30 years ago to tackle rural poverty, a key consequence of the droughts and famines of the early 1970s. Since 1978, IFAD has invested more than US$10 billion in low-interest loans and grants that have helped over 300 million very poor rural women and men increase their incomes and provide for their families.
IFAD is an international financial institution and a specialized United Nations agency. It is a global partnership of OECD, OPEC and other developing countries. Today, IFAD supports more than 200 programmes and projects in 81 developing countries and one territory.