Message from the director of the Western and Central Africa Division
The international community is working to improve aid effectiveness and development impact. As part of this global action IFAD has developed and is implementing an Action Plan to increase its development effectiveness. The plan focuses on achieving three primary targets: by 2009, 100 per cent of IFAD projects will have a high or substantial degree of congruence with country development strategies and priorities, 80 per cent of IFAD projects will achieve their development objectives, and 60 per cent or more of IFAD projects will have a high or substantial level of efficiency. The Action Plan is bringing about a major transformation in the way IFAD does business, and particularly in the design, implementation and supervision of its projects and programmes.
In the Western and Central Africa Division we are working hard to meet the Action Plan targets, but we face several challenges. Weak institutional and policy framework at country level, conflict, inadequate project management capacity and lack of disbursement of counterpart funds are some of the constraints on improving performance. In 2006, 11 out of 50 projects were evaluated as ‘problem’ projects in the region.
To overcome these challenges and meet the Action Plan targets, we are implementing a campaign called “80 by ‘08”. The division’s goal is to have 80 per cent of projects and programmes in non-conflict countries rated ‘good’ or ‘better’ by the end of 2008. Our aim is to improve the performance of projects supervised by cooperating institutions such as the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), the World Bank, the African Development Bank and the West African Development Bank. We also want country programme managers (CPMs) to directly supervise more projects. To do this, the division has developed a strategy that is built on three main pillars: people, process and resources.
Beginning in 2007, each CPM will directly supervise at least one project, and the number will increase over time. CPMs will ensure close follow-up to address specific implementation issues in problem projects. The Division will also monitor cooperating institutions’ portfolios closely so that projects do not slip into a problem status.
To enable people to take on these new responsibilities, the division will equip staff both at headquarters and in the field with the skills they need to improve supervision. CPMs, assistants and field and project staff will be trained, and the division will bring in consultants with specialized technical and financial expertise in loan administration to support staff in implementation and procurement. An implementation specialist joined the division in February 2007 to support the process.
The division has adopted a new organizational structure, organizing staff into five clusters. This will enable staff to share the workload both within the clusters and with field staff, and to manage time more efficiently. For a problem project, cluster members will provide support and assistance. The next step will be to increase the number of CPMs to reduce the ratio of projects per CPM. To achieve that objective, the division will work towards reducing the number of projects in the regional portfolio. Programme assistants will have more responsibilities in programme implementation. New initiatives will require additional staff.
On the resources front, the division is realigning funds to meet the new implementation priority. More funds will be made available for direct supervision. As CPMs take over and manage cooperating institutions’ projects, they will become more entrepreneurial in looking for additional resources from various sources of financing such as grants, cofinanciers, governments and the Global Environment Facility.
Achieving the 80 by ‘08 objective requires the commitment of IFAD, project staff and all partners. Together, we will make it!
Mohamed Béavogui
Stories from the field
Financial services associations: the Benin success stories
“If you are deep into a never-ending sleep and someone comes and wakes you up, it can only be very good for you.” Cica Sossou, a farmer from Benin, says she got her wake-up call from the microfinance activities of the Income-Generating Activities Project (PAGER). “I have been so successful in the group’s activities that my husband has decided to join.”
PAGER was closed recently after successful operations, particularly development of a strong component of financial services associations (FSAs). The FSA model first appeared in Africa some ten years ago in response to poor rural people’s lack of access to formal financial services.
Initiated as village-level financial structures, FSAs are owned and operated by the villagers themselves. They focus both on mobilizing equity and on delivering credit.
Since 1998, 144 FSAs have been created in Benin under two IFAD projects, PAGER and the Microfinance and Marketing Project (PROMIC). As of December 2005, the projects involved 820 villages representing 40 per cent of the country’s rural villages, and 32 per cent of Benin’s microfinance institutions. Approximately 60,000 shareholders participate in FSAs (47 per cent of them are men, 48 per cent are women, and 5 per cent comprise production and marketing groups), with a total cumulative mobilized capital of US$1.2 million (and with 35 per cent of it in the hands of women). The amount of loans approved reached US$13.0 million, representing more than 12 times the mobilized capital.
“FSAs have really taken off successfully in Benin,” says CPM Mohamed Tounessi. “They have filled the gap left by the more classic microfinance institutions, proving that they are the right tool to facilitate access to credit for poor rural people.”
The novelty of the concept attracted thousands of villagers, many of whom had never dealt with a bank or a financial institution before. Through FSAs, poor rural people were able to access credit without facing the usual deterrents such as the time and cost of repeated travel to a bank’s branch office, a high minimum loan requirement, and laborious paperwork.
“I am now used to obtaining credit at the Avakpa village FSA,” says Dolou Abayo, a member of the Ayidote FSA group. “The scheme has helped me develop my small commercial activity. I buy beans or maize from the village and on local markets to sell later to the big national market in Cotonou. I used some of the profits to repair the roof of my bedroom, which was damaged during a storm. I have already bought seven shares in the FSA and I am planning to obtain more.”
Living conditions in the communities involved have generally improved, with increased school attendance and improved household nutrition and family stability. Communities are especially proud of their strong ownership of the FSAs they built during the six-year project.
For more information, please contact
Mohamed Tounessi, country programme manager, Benin
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Innovation: a reward for Mr Cowpea
Bir Bahadur Singh, a recently retired plant breeder at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), has been given the Outstanding Senior Scientist Award by the Consultative Group of International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). Widely known as Mr Cowpea, he has contributed to development of quick-maturing varieties of cowpea ready for harvest in only 60 days. Dr Singh has worked in collaboration with IITA and national research systems scientists to develop and test cowpea varieties with tolerance and resistance to more than ten diseases and to drought and heat. His cowpea-based innovations have significantly reduced poverty and hunger for small farmers in the West and Central African region, with spill-over effects on others.
Dr Singh was last posted at the IITA station in Kano, in northern Nigeria, where he saw farmers escape from poverty in as few as two years. “We started working with 11 farmers in Kano in 1998,” he said. “In 2005, more than 3,000 farmers were directly involved, and over 100,000 indirectly.”
Cowpea is one of Africa’s most versatile crops. It feeds people and livestock, and it is a nitrogen-fixing legume that improves soil fertility. The crop generates cash income for the poorest people in drought-prone and vulnerable zones. Dr Singh’s more reliable varieties help ensure that this early-maturing ‘hungry season’ crop can provide income and sustenance in the period before the harvest of cereal crops.
Despite these successes, challenges remain in the contribution of cowpea cultivation to food security and poverty reduction. They include constraints of access to input such as seeds and output markets for the large diffusion of improved varieties, and the need for diffusion of integrated pest management technologies to reduce crop losses and improve product quality. Some of these challenges have been taken up by IITA and IFAD.
Since 2000, IITA and IFAD have been collaborating on developing and disseminating cowpea innovations through a research grant called Projet Niébé pour l’Afrique (PRONAF). IITA received two large grants from IFAD for a total value of US$2.6 million, to develop a strong and effective participatory cowpea research and diffusion project in five West African countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger and Nigeria). The project contributed to adoption and diffusion of improved varieties (with high yields, a short cycle and tolerance to diseases), integrated pest management options, improved storage techniques, and forage for livestock in semi-arid drought-prone and vulnerable areas. The success of the project in diffusing cowpea innovations is linked with the empowerment of small farmers through farmer field schools and now through farmer field forums. Another key element of success is the multidisciplinary teamwork involving the national agricultural research and extension systems of partner countries including Benin, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger and Nigeria, and NGOs and the private and public sectors. PRONAF has been successful in adapting the farmer field school (FFS) approach and later in promoting the farmer field forum (FFF) approach.
“The FFF is a participatory and cost-effective tool to empower small farmers with knowledge and information for optimal decision-making and choices of innovations,” says Ousmane Coulibaly, an agricultural economist at IITA Benin and PRONAF regional coordinator. “In eight years, FFS and FFF have contributed to a substantial increase in the adoption and diffusion rates of most of the cowpea innovations, such as new varieties, botanical pesticides, good agricultural practices, optimal use of recommended pesticides and sustainable post-harvest management.”
It has been easy to measure the success of PRONAF in disseminating the technologies developed by Dr Singh and other scientists at IITA and the national agricultural research systems (NARS) in the region, where productivity in field schools is much higher than that of farmers’ usual practices. It proved, for example, that using relevant botanical pesticides when they are made available can increase productivity and decrease pesticide hazards, contributing to healthier communities and a healthier environment.
“The first year we attended the FFS, we were given 500 CFA francs per session, and some people thought that getting the money was our motivation,” says Marcelline, a woman farmer from Davihoué-Ablomé, in Benin, expressing the interest created by outstanding innovations. “But this year, without receiving anything, many more are attending the training and they are even ready to pay for it,” says Marcelline, an advocate of the FFS approach.
For more information, please contact
Ousmane Coulibaly, agricultural economist at IITA Benin and PRONAF regional coordinator
Useful link
Scientists of the CGIAR – Rebecca Khelseau-Carsky – November 2005
Niger: a partnership agreement to boost rural development in Maradi
Two years from the onset of a dramatic drought, the Maradi region of southern Niger is at the centre of a multilateral humanitarian cooperation programme. In December 2006 ten United Nations agencies and three bilateral donors in the country signed an agreement initiated by IFAD to reinforce their partnerships and harmonize their interventions.
“This joint enterprise perfectly translates the spirit of a common programme approach under the reform process engaged by the UN Secretary General,” says the UN coordinator in Niger, Michele Falavigna. “It is centred on alignment with national priorities, and the simplification and harmonization of development aid procedures.”
Within this context IFAD has revised its strategy in Niger to achieve greater impact. The strategy is built around three main thrusts: geographic concentration (the Maradi region covers 3 per cent of the territory and has 20 per cent of the nation’s population), thematic focus (on food security, agricultural productivity and improvement of rural household incomes), and financial and technical partnerships with other UN agencies and donors to increase aid effectiveness.
In the same spirit, in December 2006 IFAD’s Executive Board approved a new Agricultural and Rural Rehabilitation and Development Initiative Project to help approximately 340,000 people cope with recurrent natural disasters, increase their income and improve the productivity of their crops and livestock, as well as the level of poor rural people’s access to social services in the Maradi region.
The new project is cofinanced by the World Food Programme, the Belgian Survival Fund and the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID). It has been formulated to create synergies between existing donor interventions in Maradi, to ensure better coordination and to enhance aid effectiveness in line with the Memorandum of Understanding negotiated between the government and the Maradi donor community.
The partnership agreement has been designed in line with the United Nations Development Assistance Framework and the Paris Declaration focusing on aid effectiveness that was adopted in 2005 by 90 countries and 27 development institutions. It bases development aid on the principles of ownership, harmonization, alignment, results and mutual accountability.
For more information, please contact:
Hubert Boirard, country programme manager, Niger
News and events
IFAD joins the Manobi Consortium to support the Free Market Information Services for Subsistence and Vulnerable Farmers in Africa project
The mobile telephone is increasingly considered to be a powerful business tool for small farmers. The Free Market Information Services for Subsistence and Vulnerable Farmers in Africa project has the aim of leveraging out of poverty some 630,000 vulnerable farmers currently supported by IFAD and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) projects in Western and Central Africa. The project was initiated by Manobi, Africa’s first provider of mobile data services, which created a consortium to develop a proposal for supporting small and vulnerable farmers with innovative marketing services. The proposal was submitted to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and is one of the 40 proposals selected among 1,400 projects. Through this project IFAD will support the introduction of mobile telephone tools, software and business services for smallholder farmers in the region, to enhance the impact of its operations on the ground for poor rural people.
The economic development of African farmers is limited by their weak capacity to market their products. There is a need to support vulnerable farmers with new and creative strategies, marketing tools and services that they can easily and quickly learn to use. New market information systems and the dynamic growth of cellular technology can turn poor rural farmers into active players in the market. Transforming the telephone into a tool for market information exchange will increase the participation of smallholder farmers in trade. Mobile telephones will also serve as a monitoring and evaluation tool for IFAD-funded projects.
Together with Manobi and IFAD, the consortium comprises USAID, the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Cooperation (CTA), the World GSM Association and the International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD). The full proposal for the final selection was submitted in January 2007.
For more information, please contact:
Leopold Sarr, country programme manager, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, the Gambia
Directors of the Executive Board, members of the Evaluation Committee and IFAD staff visit Mali
The people of the Niafunke area reserved a warm welcome for the large delegation that visited their villages on 5 March in connection with the National Round-table Workshop for the Mali Country Programme Evaluation (CPE). From 4 to 6 March 2007, the Evaluation Committee, Executive Board members and IFAD staff travelled to Timbuktu and visited the IFAD-funded Zone Lacustre Development Project, Phase II (PDZL II). The IFAD delegation was accompanied by Seydou Traoré, Minister of Agriculture, Lansry Nana Yaya Haidara, Commissioner for Food Security, and Ibrahim Bocar Daga, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Mali to IFAD.
“We were impressed by the results achieved, which no doubt are a reflection of the enthusiasm and commitment of the rural poor, the government and all others involved in implementing the programme,” said Vladimir Hernandez Lara, chair of the IFAD Evaluation Committee, after the field visit. PDZL II is located in northern Mali, a region affected by desertification and poor living conditions. The delegation visited ponds, lakes, drinking water points, a motorized pontoon, a school and a health centre funded at the early stage of the project. One year after the project closed, poor rural people are able to maintain these infrastructures themselves, with encouraging results.
Following the field visit, the participants took part in the CPE National Round-table Workshop on 7 and 8 March in Bamako. The workshop was attended by more than 100 participants who engaged in fruitful discussions relevant to future IFAD-funded activities in Mali.
During their visit to the country, Executive Board Directors and IFAD staff met with the President and Prime Minister of Mali.
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Ghana: President Kufuor commissions the ARB Apex Bank head office
The ARB Apex Bank was established to function as a ‘mini central bank’ to provide banking and non-banking services to rural and community banks in Ghana. The ARB Apex Bank is a component of the Rural Financial Services Project. The project was financed with resources from IFAD, the International Development Association, the African Development Bank and the Government of Ghana. John A. Kufuor, President of the Republic of Ghana, commissioned the ARB Apex Bank head office and Accra branch building on 16 November 2006.
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IFAD’s 30th Governing Council calls for more rural employment opportunities
IFAD’s Governing Council met on 14-15 February in Rome. Delegates from IFAD’s 165 Member States, including ministers of finance, agriculture and rural development, attended the annual meeting, which this year had the theme of “Rural employment and livelihoods”. Round-table discussions were held on three topics related to the theme: migration and rural employment, rural employment promotion through the value chain approach, and generation of remunerative livelihood opportunities for rural youth.
IFAD President Lennart Båge reported on IFAD’s highly successful 2006 work programme and the organization’s plans to further improve performance in the future. “We are strengthening IFAD to make it ready to meet the challenges ahead of us. We are determined to put agriculture and rural poverty back on the international agenda,” he said. For Kevin Cleaver, IFAD Assistant President for Programme Management, the support from IFAD’s Governors “enables IFAD to provide financial and technical support to a large number of projects in developing countries, and provides legitimacy to the approach that IFAD follows in its projects.”
The Governing Council is IFAD’s highest decision-making authority and serves as a forum for discussing policy and budget issues relating to the global fight against rural poverty.
Useful links
- IFAD Member States say development effectiveness demands “true partnerships” as the 30th Governing Council draws to a close
- 30th Session of IFAD's Governing Council
New loans and grants to fight rural poverty in Western and Central Africa
The 89th Executive Board held from 12 to 14 December at IFAD headquarters in Rome approved US$40.4 million in loans to improve the living conditions of poor rural people in Western and Central Africa. The loans and grants will support development projects and programmes in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger.
The Board also approved more than US$9.4 million in grants to international centres that promote agricultural research, training and technical assistance. The recipients are the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT), Biodiversity International (IPGRI), members of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the Netherlands-based International Development Organization (SNV) and the West Africa Rural Foundation (WARF).
In Burkina Faso, IFAD has provided a loan of US$13.8 million to strengthen the supply chain for five commodities: cowpea, sesame, goats/sheep, poultry and onions, which offer significant opportunities for poor rural people to boost their incomes. About 20,000 rural households will improve their livelihoods through the new Agricultural Commodity Chain Support Project. The project will focus on activities in the North, Central North, Boucle du Mouhoun and Sahel regions in the north of the country. Farmers, pastoralists, local entrepreneurs and others will learn how to process the commodities into more marketable products that can be sold at a higher price. The project will improve access to rural financial services. The loan agreement was signed on 15 March at IFAD headquarters by the Ambassador of Burkina Faso, Mamadou Sissoko, and by IFAD President Lennart Båge.
In Mali, the Kidal Integrated Rural Development Programme was designed to boost incomes and living conditions for the region’s most vulnerable households, including nomadic herders. The programme is backed by a loan of US$11.3 million from IFAD. Small-scale livestock farmers will benefit from improved basic services and infrastructure, including water and fodder supplies. Over 20,000 people in the Kidal region of Mali will participate in the programme to promote agropastoral activities. Activities will give particular attention to improving the living conditions of rural women. The loan agreement was signed on 16 February 2007 at IFAD headquarters in Rome by Ibrahim Bocar Daga, Ambassador of Mali to Italy, and Lennart Båge, President of IFAD.
IFAD will help fight rural poverty in Niger with a loan of US$15.3 million and a grant of US$400,000. The funds 
will support the Agricultural and Rural Rehabilitation and Development Initiative Project in the Maradi region. The project will enable villagers to develop financial and human resources to cope with recurrent natural disasters and combat malnutrition, and to increase their income and improve the productivity of their crops and livestock. The project has the aim of strengthening the capacity of rural communities and the government to prevent or address crises such as crop infestations and drought. About 340,000 poor people are expected to benefit from the project. The loan and grant agreements were signed at IFAD headquarters on 9 February 2007 by Ausseil Mireille Fatouma, Ambassador of the Republic of Niger, and by IFAD’s Assistant President for External Affairs, Matthew Wyatt.
The Executive Board also approved IFAD’s new strategic framework for the 2007-2010 period, as well as a new policy on supervision and implementation support.
For more information, please contact:
Karim Hussein, regional economist
Norman Messer, country programme manager, Burkina Faso
Nadine Gbossa, country programme manager, Mali
Hubert Boirard, country programme manager, Niger