Message from the director of the Western and Central Africa Division
Dear friends and colleagues:
It is with pleasure that I welcome you to another edition of FIDAction, our first for 2009.
Looking back, we can be proud that in 2008, the Western and Central Africa Division reached its objective of having at least 80 per cent of its projects rated ‘good or better’.
And looking forward, there is still considerable work to be done. Our goal of eradicating rural poverty in the region continues to be hampered by the global financial crisis, climate change and rising food prices. Because of these added challenges, we must step up our efforts to ensure that our programmes and projects are more effective and perform better.
During our recent Regional Implementation Workshop, held in Douala, Cameroon on 27-30 January 2009, we reviewed the performance of our programmes and projects and agreed on an Action Plan for 2009. The Action Plan conforms to IFAD’s Strategic Framework 2007-2010 and to reforms designed to enhance development effectiveness throughout the organization. These reforms include
- Managing for development results, with a focus on strategic priorities, and on monitoring and assessing results
- Promoting innovation and knowledge sharing
- Emphasizing country ownership
- Increasing direct supervision of IFAD-supported programmes and projects
- Enhancing country presence
- Expanding efforts to work with other development partners
The reforms will help increase the impact of agricultural and rural development programmes and projects in the region. Meanwhile, the Division will continue to improve learning and knowledge sharing, foster synergies across projects and provide avenues for collaboration with strategic partners.
This issue of FIDAction highlights the conclusions of the Douala workshop as well as some innovations and knowledge developed during the implementation of our programmes, projects and grants in the region. Our work has the potential to make a huge impact on the lives of poor rural people in the region. Therefore, wemust continue to learn lessons from our successes – and from our failures – and scale-up our knowledge and innovations as widely as possible.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank you all – friends and colleagues – for being committed partners in our shared commitment to improve the livelihoods of people in rural communities in Western and Central Africa.
Mohamed Béavogui
The Douala Action Plan offers a new way forward
Representatives of governments, cooperating institutions, IFAD-supported programmes and projects, and IFAD staff met in Douala from 27 to 29 January for the traditional Regional Implementation Workshop. Approximately 160 participants from West and Central Africa gathered for three days to:
Workshop participants developed concrete short- and medium-term recommendations to improve the quality and performance of IFAD-financed programmes and projects. The recommendations can be found in the Douala Action Plan for 2009-2010, which defines the objectives, activities, persons in charge, and indicators that will be used to assess and measure the results. Participants formulated four groups of recommendations: Improve the partnership between IFAD, governments and partners in the conduct of programmes and projects by Country Programme Management Teams
Improve loan management, implementation support and the performance of service providers
Improve project monitoring and evaluation, impact, the results and impact measurement system, and sustainability
Promote knowledge management and innovation
For more information, please contact:
Useful link:
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Stories from the field
Cassava-farming student inspires friends and family in Cameroon
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Growing cassava has brought Noah Adolphe success and respect in his village | |
Unlike many Cameroonian youths who finance their higher education with urban-area jobs, Noah Adolphe took up farming. Adolphe, now a 4th year student in political science at the University of Yaounde, obtained his first degree in 2005 and then headed to his village in Nlong, about 50 kilometres from Yaounde.
“I started off with a sweet potato farm but sales were poor and I had big post-harvest losses,” he says. “I switched to cassava on the advice of my uncle, Bala Tsang. He registered me in a common initiative group in Nkenglikok so I could benefit from IFAD support through the national Roots and Tubers Market-Driven Development Programme (PNDRT).”
With financial and technical assistance from PNDRT, Adolphe cultivated 2 hectares of cassava and used the profits from his cassava farm to cultivate an additional 2 hectares, this time with improved new varieties provided by the programme.
“Production and sales of the improved varieties are good because the crops suit the area and there is a ready market for cassava and cassava products like garri, water fufu and cassava flour,” says Adolphe. “Every week I make about FCFA 25,000 [US$50] from the sale of my crop.”
With the profits, Adolphe has been able to finance his education, assist his family members, and build a good house. He has been an inspiration to other young people in his village, inspiring six other youths to take up agricultural activities. As a result of his success, his farm has attracted several delegations of interested people, including local dignitaries and representatives from PNDRT, IFAD and the European Union.
“My friends didn’t believe it when I said I was coming to the village to do farming. Now they respect me,” Adolphe says.
As a graduate student, Adolphe commutes between Yaounde and Nlong, attending classes once a week and looking after his farm for the rest of the time. He says he will not abandon agriculture even if he gets a white-collar job in the city. His ambition now is to double his production and to buy equipment for processing cassava into flour, pellets, tapioca and extract starch.
As more and more people turn to cassava farming in Nlong, Adolphe has brought the farmers together under the banner of a common initiative group. He has opened a bank account for the group, which will help the members better manage their finances and give them the opportunity to benefit from assistance from the donor community.
For more information, please contact:
- Sylvie Marzin, Country Programme Manager
[email protected]
- Noah Adolphe
[email protected]
Useful links:
Profile: A woman takes charge in the two Congos
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Monique Mputu at the IFAD regional implementation workshop in Douala, Cameroon | |
Monique Mputu is IFAD’s Field Country Officer for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Congo. Trained as an agriculture technician, she began her career at the Ministry of Agriculture of the DRC where she rose to the rank of a director. She subsequently was hired by IFAD as country representative for the two Congos in December 2005. She is now based in Kinshasa. There are currently two IFAD projects in the DRC and a third is expected to become operational this year. The Congo has three ongoing projects.
“I am at ease in the field as well as in the office and have no complex about working with men,” she says. “As a director in the Congolese Ministry of Agriculture, I had 35 men and three women under my supervision.”
Affectionately called ‘Maman’ by her IFAD and Ministry of Agriculture colleagues, Mputu says she applied for the job because she loves new challenges and experiences.
Those challenges include numerous trips between the two countries for supervision missions, meetings and other programmed visits, which is why she is a staunch advocate for harmonizing missions. Another challenge in the two Congos are cassava pests and cricket invasions. Mputu is planning to invite a technician from Cameroon to help to eradicate these problems.
But there are also rewards in her job, such as the regional project implementation workshop she attended in Douala in January.
“I found the meeting very enriching because it enabled me to exchange experiences with my colleagues from other parts of the region.”
Mputu is married and a mother of three: two are married and the youngest is a university student. And in the true spirit of African communalism, she also lives with several nephews and nieces.
For more information, please contact:
- Mohamed Manssouri, Country Programme Manager
[email protected]
- Monique Mputu, Field Country Officer
[email protected]
Useful links
Rural finance as a ‘driving engine’ for growth: lessons from The Gambia
Since the mid-1980s, IFAD’s focus in The Gambia has been on financing rural microfinance projects. The strategy of the Rural Finance and Community Initiatives Project (RFCIP), which ran from 1999 through 2006, was to use credit as the ‘driving engine’ to bring about positive change in rural communities. Its objective was to sustainably boost food production and increase incomes for poor rural people who were struggling to produce their own food or to sell farm products to buy food.
The project, supervised directly by IFAD, filled critical gaps and made a significant contribution to enhancing food security and household incomes in the country.
The project strengthened an established network of village banks, which were owned and managed by the community they served. These included the traditional village-level kalos and the Village Savings and Credit Associations (VISACAs), a strategy that earned the acceptance of the local communities. With its emphasis on self-reliance and on providing a broad range of services, the project expanded the rural financial network in the country. This was in line with the government’s policy of establishing a favourable economic and regulatory environment for private financial institutions. Within the overall food security framework, women were integrated into the decision-making process.
At the end of the project, staff and participants worked together to review and describe the lessons learned, including:
Farmer training should be given top priority in any project that is designed for farmers.
- Farmers who received training in skills development, business planning and awareness creation had considerable success when planning, implementing and managing RFCIP-supported community projects. Training helped them discover their own potential, gave them self-confidence and led them to search for workable solutions to their problems.
To avoid providing inappropriate services, it is essential to assess the capacity of service providers and other implementing partners.
- If necessary, the project should also offer them capacity building opportunities. This has been proven to be very effective in the implementation of RFCIP.
Development practitioners can rely on participatory monitoring and evaluation (PM&E) for success in grassroots interventions.
- PM&E activities have been very effective in enabling project participants to identify their weaknesses and constraints and to develop strategies to tackle them.
The VISACA model has been recognized by rural people as an important and viable system for pooling their own resources in order to provide microcredit on a sustainable basis.
- VISACAs have made a large contribution to the socio-economic status of resource-poor farmers in The Gambia. To meet rural demand for credit, the project financed more than 40 new VISACAs, strengthening and expanding the microfinance network introduced under the IFAD-funded Jahaly and Pacharr Smallholder Project.
The Gambia has had a long history of cooperation with IFAD. In partnership with the African Development Bank, IFAD began financing projects in the eastern region of the country in 1982. So far, IFAD has supported eight projects in The Gambia for a total of US$140 million. Two microfinance projects have helped increase access to credit for poor rural people. These two projects created 70 Village Savings and Credit Associations (VISACAs) with more than 50,000 members, generating approximately US$1 million (20 million Gambian dollars). Six of the eight IFAD-supported projects have been phased out. The two ongoing projects are the Rural Finance Project and the Participatory Integrated Watershed Management Project, cofinanced with the African Development Bank. “Since villagers manage their own banks and need to build their capacities for financial management, the challenge now is to improve the microfinance industry,” says Alasan M. Bah, coordinator of the Rural Finance Project. Bah says that it is sometimes difficult to implement IFAD projects in the country because the government is obligated to deposit a counterpart fund in the central bank, and the national assembly must ratify the project before it can begin. “This bureaucracy delays the start of a project and this leads to the project receiving a poor rating.”
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For more information, please contact:
- Leopold Sarr, Country Programme Manager
[email protected]
- Alasane M. Bah, RFP Project Coordinator
[email protected]
Useful links:
Commitment and hard work binds a community together in Nigeria
Woda is a poor rural community blessed with abundant natural resources and a rich culture located in the Yala Local Government Area in Northern Cross River State, Nigeria. It is one of three communities in the area that is participating in the IFAD-supported Community-Based Natural Resource Management Programme – Niger Delta (CBNRMP).
Thanks to the programme, Woda residents are working together to raise 2,000 oil palm seedlings and to construct a six-classroom school. Others are learning beekeeping, tailoring, hairdressing or auto mechanics. With new skills and a commitment to cooperation, the residents of Woda have built a more prosperous, more cohesive and more secure community.
“The success of the programme is largely due to the cooperation of the community residents,” says Irene Ibifuro Jumbo-Ibeakuzie, CBNRMP Programme Manager. “The unity and respect for the village authority is unsurpassed. The successes show just how committed the residents are to achieving the set objectives of the programme.”
Following participatory rural appraisal activities and training, community members prioritized projects that had been approved by the village authority. Community members then unanimously agreed to set aside one day a week – every Tuesday – for communal work to ensure that their community contribution, which is 10 per cent in cash or kind, is completely met.
For example, to make building blocks for various projects, some fetch water, haul sand, and mould and stack the blocks. Others water the oil palm nursery and attend to beehives. They also hold regular meetings to assess the progress they have made and to decide upon other projects that will benefit the community.
“The programme is very much focused on community ownership of the projects, and the residents have fully embraced that concept,” says Jumbo-Ibeakuzie. “Their enthusiastic commitment has helped bind the people together towards a common goal and has really improved community cohesion.”
Woda residents have also come to a consensus on a novel way to curb crime in their community. They display a list of crime suspects in a public place in full view of everyone.
“The thought of having their names displayed in that manner has constantly discouraged would-be criminals,” says Jumbo-Ibeakuzie. “As a result, the security and sustainability of projects in Woda Community is not in question.”
The local government council has also shown an unprecedented level of participation in the programme, which has gone a long way to boost rural development in the Yala Local Government Council. The local government council established a grass-cutter facility and is in the process of establishing facilities for swine processing and aquaculture, all of which will provide training for farmers in the community.
For more information, please contact:
- Abdoul W. Barry, Country Programme Manager
[email protected]
- Irene Ibifuro Jumbo-Ibeakuzie, CBNRMP Programme Manager
[email protected]
Useful links:
News and events
Portfolio redistribution in the Western and Central Africa Division becomes effective 15 May, 2009
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Portfolio Management Team
Team 1
Team 2
Team 3
Team 4
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Nigerian-born Kanayo F. Nwanze takes the reins at IFAD
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Kanayo F. Nwanze, IFAD’s fifth president | |
During its annual meeting held in Rome on 18 February 2009, IFAD’s Governing Council chose Kanayo F. Nwanze as its fifth president. Nwanze took over from Lennart Båge, who completed his two-term mandate. Nwanze took up his new post on 1 April 2009.
Nwanze has a strong record as an advocate for change, and a keen understanding of the complexity of development issues. During his 10 years as Director-General of the Africa Rice Centre (WARDA), Nwanze was instrumental in introducing and promoting New Rice for Africa (NERICA), a high-yield, drought- and pest-resistant rice variety developed specifically for the African landscape. His work in developing countries in Africa, Asia and the Americas is complemented by two years as Vice-President at IFAD’s headquarters in Rome.
“Achieving concrete results and impact on the ground with our programmes and projects will continue to be at the core of IFAD,” Nwanze says. “With enhanced country presence and direct supervision we will continue to reinforce our quality agenda. Our challenge will be to make agriculture the central focus of governments, reduce poverty and hunger, and achieve the Millennium Development Goals.”
Delegates from 165 Member States appointed Nwanze by acclamation, following an election involving Nwanze and four other candidates.
IFAD publishes study on pre-cooked, vacuum-packed cassava
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Processed cassava products could yield good income for entrepreneurs in Cameroon and Ghana | |
Demand for pre-cooked, vacuum-packed cassava in the Cameroon cities of Douala and Yaounde alone could soon be as much as 20,000 tons per year. This is one conclusion of a feasibility study conducted by IFAD’s Regional Cassava Processing and Marketing Initiative in partnership with the Market-Driven Roots and Tubers Development Programme (PNDRT). The study’s results were presented at the Regional Implementation Workshop in Douala on 26 January 2009.
”The development of new cassava derivatives will add value to agricultural products and offer new opportunities for investment in the agro-industry,” says Abdoul Barry, IFAD’s Country Programme Manager in Cameroon. “This is why we are calling on the Cameroonian government to support people who are willing to invest in this sector.”
PNDRT started out by boosting cassava production, and now encourages processing and marketing. The target market for new products from this popular root is single, working people living in urban areas who do not have time to cook.
The pre-cooked cassava is packaged in one kilogram, vacuum-packed sachets. It’s easy to use and can be conserved for long periods of time without losing quality. The technique can be extended to other roots and tubers such as yams, sweet potatoes and Irish potatoes. The project is estimated to cost about US$300,000 (FCFA 256,805 million), including civil works, and has been proposed in Ghana as well.
The study is available on the FIDAfrique website.
For more information, please contact:
- Andrea Serpagli, Regional Coordinator, Regional Cassava Processing and Marketing Initiative
[email protected]
Useful link:
Tree domestication project a continuing success in Cameroon
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A woman tends seedlings in a small tree nursery in Cameroon | |
IFAD and the World Agroforestry Centre have launched the third phase of a joint project to fight poverty, desertification and global warming.
The project, Promoting Rural Innovation through Participatory Tree Domestication in Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Nigeria, was announced at a ceremony on 4 February in Yaounde. Madeleine Tchuinte, Cameroon’s Minister of Scientific Research and Innovation, said the tree domestication project falls in line with her government’s poverty reduction and environmental protection policies.
“The World Agroforestry Centre, with IFAD support, has worked in Cameroon for more than six years,” said Zac Tchoundjeu, the centre’s Regional Director for West and Central Africa. “Our ongoing, successful collaboration has made Cameroon a world leader in tree domestication.”
The World Agroforestry Centre’s research focuses on domesticating indigenous wild fruit trees by increasing their productivity and reducing their production cycle. The work is carried out on more than 20 indigenous tree species, including the African nut popularly known as Njansang, prunus (an African medicinal plant), bush mangoes and African plum. Researchers use three propagation techniques – cuttings, marcotting and grafting.
This is the third phase of the project. It will last three years, with funding provided by IFAD and technical expertise provided by the World Agroforestry Centre.
For more information, please contact:
- Ann Degrande, Socio-economist, World Agroforestry Centre [email protected]
New programmes and projects in the region
IFAD will provide a US$6 million loan to the Republic of Ghana, to finance the first tranche of the Rural and Agricultural Programme in support of the Government of Ghana’s efforts to improve access to sustainable financial services in rural areas.
The programme will strengthen institutional performance, outreach and client orientation in the overall rural financial system, with particular attention to agricultural finance. It will help increase the productive potential of smallholder farmers and give them greater access to technical assistance and risk management tools within the agricultural value chains. The value chain is an organizational process that ensures that the worth of the raw product increases at each stage of the chain that runs from farm gate to consumer. The programme will also help rural and community banks effectively serve smallholder farmers and poor rural people, who are their main clients.
Niger will receive a US$8 million loan and a US$8 million grant from IFAD for the second phase of a rural rehabilitation project that will support the decentralization process of the Government of Niger. The Community Action Programme, which will run from 2008 until 2012, will be cofinanced by the Global Environment Facility and the World Bank/International Development Association. The financing agreement was signed on 15 January 2009 in Rome.
The Agricultural and Rural Rehabilitation and Development Initiative Project – Institutional Strengthening Component complements the existing IFAD interventions in the Maradi region. It will help strengthen the ability of 56 rural communes in the region to run local affairs competently, including planning, implementing and operating investments aimed at improving food security and quality of life. The project will also seek to reduce or reverse land degradation by promoting sustainable land management.
To date, IFAD has funded nine programmes and projects in Niger for a total of about US$111 million.
A US$23.33 million grant from IFAD to the Democratic Republic of the Congo for the Integrated Rural Rehabilitation Programme will help reduce poverty and food insecurity, and improve the living conditions of poor rural people in Maniema Province. The grant agreement was signed on 6 February 2009.
Located in the eastern region of the DRC, Maniema Province was severely damaged by war between 1996 and 2003, and the effects of looting, violence and deaths have had serious consequences for the local population. The province suffers from chronic food shortages, very low incomes and limited access to basic social services. In support of the country’s efforts to peacefully rebuild the nation, the programme will focus on boosting the incomes of communities by reviving agricultural production; increasing breeding and fishing activities; improving access to markets; and enhancing access to health care and drinking water in the most vulnerable areas of the province. Approximately 42,200 households will benefit from the programme.
To date, IFAD has funded six rural development projects in the Democratic Republic of the Congo for a total of about US$80 million.
More projects approved on 30 April 2009
Grant:
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Improving food security in the Congo
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M. Rigobert Maboundou, Congolese Minister of Agriculture and Livestock | |
In March, IFAD and the Congo launched PRODER 3, a project aimed at improving food security among poor rural people in the Likouala, Pool and Sangha departments. PRODER 3, which will cost US$18.67 million and span six years, will boost agricultural production and productivity and increase incomes by improving cassava cultivation systems and access to production basins. The project is organized around four components: support for re-launching agriculture; capacity building; access to production basins; and coordination, communication and management.
“PRODER 3 became effective only four months after the grant agreement was signed, which is a record compared to the 13-month average in the Western and Central Africa Division,” said Luyaku Loko Nsimpasi, IFAD’s Country Programme Manager for the Congo, during the seminar to launch the project. He called on the project managers to put in place a management system based on results and impacts. He also urged the project participants to get involved in all the phases of the project. He recommended that women be given more encouragement to participate, especially in capacity building and training.
“PRODER 3 has to be like the two previous phases of the programme – an instrument for the visibility of government action in the rural areas,” says M. Rigobert Maboundou, Congolese Minister of Agriculture and Livestock. He quoted President Sassou Nguesso in a speech during the high-level meeting on the food crisis held in Rome in June 2008: “A people that does not produce what they consume are not free.”
PRODER 3 is the outcome of negotiations between the Congolese government and international organizations such as IFAD and OPEC, which culminated in the signing of a grant accord in Rome in 2008. The Congolese government is contributing nearly US$2.1 million, or 11.12 per cent of the total cost of the project. It is the third IFAD investment in the Republic of the Congo in the agricultural and rural development sector, following PRODER-NORD and PRODER-SUD.
For more information, please contact:
- Mohamed Manssouri, Country Programme Manager
[email protected]
Useful links:
FIDAfrique/IFADAfrica launches third phase of the sub-Saharan knowledge sharing network
The start-up workshop for the third phase of the FIDAfrique/IFADAfrica Network’s Programme for Promoting Knowledge Sharing and Innovation for Rural Poverty Reduction in sub-Saharan Africa was held in Nairobi from 20 to 24 April 2009. The workshop was the launching pad for the Knowledge Management sub-Saharan Network, which includes IFAD-funded programmes and projects and partners from the Western and Central Region and the Eastern and Southern Region.
The four-day workshop included a two-day training session on knowledge management approaches, tools and techniques.
Approximately 30 IFAD project coordinators and knowledge management officers attended, along with representatives of regional knowledge management networks from East and Southern Africa.
The third phase will be coordinated by the West Africa Rural Foundation and the African Rural and Agricultural Credit Association, which coordinated the workshop. Phase III comprises three main components: capacity-building and training; support for knowledge harvesting, sharing and communications; and support to policy dialogue.
For further information, please contact:
- Zoumana Bamba, Knowledge Management Officer
[email protected]
- Abdou Fall, FIDAfrique Technical Assistant
[email protected]
Useful link: