Savoirs

Sharing a vision: Partnership between the Netherlands and the International Fund for Agricultural Development A joint goal: Investing in rural people, contributing to global development Rural areas of poor countries are facing both new and continuing challenges. Among these are the world’s burgeoning population, volatile food prices, environmental degradation, climate change, diversion of farmland, declining public financing and inefficient production and trade chains. Food security and rural development, therefore, are among the top priorities of the Dutch development agenda and central to IFAD’s mandate. Over the coming decades, market oriented smallholder agriculture will be crucial to fulfilling the growing demand for food and related goods and services. It will also be fundamental to raising incomes of poor people, 70 per cent of whom live in rural areas, and protecting the environment. A shared desire to
support smallholder farmers in creating this future is at the heart of the partnership between the Netherlands and IFAD.

This paper challenges current thinking on the connection between rural transformation and food security & nutrition. It advocates that improving rural and structural transformation has a positive cyclical effect upon communities by improving food availability, access, supplies and utilization which in turn improves the health and education of communities. 

Using evidence from across the developing world, the paper creates a policy agenda to maximise potential for smallholder farming to transform local economies.

Le but de la présente publication est de mettre à la disposition des chargés de programme de pays (CPP) du FIDA, des IMF et de tous les partenaires techniques et financiers, un outil méthodologique permettant de conduire avec efficacité les processus de transformation institutionnelle ou de regroupement d’IMF – en particulier celles ayant vocation à servir les populations rurales – qui sont a priori très complexes.

L’expansion du secteur de la microfinance, en dépit des progrès enregistrés, a été entravée notamment par des obstacles tant de nature institutionnelle que financière. Cette situation a conduit certaines institutions à s’engager dans des processus d’institutionnalisation, de transformation institutionnelle ou de regroupement pour faire face aux enjeux auxquels elles sont confrontées.

De nos jours, les institutions de microfinance (IMF) se présentent sous diverses formes: projets, réseaux de caisses ou de banques villageoises, institutions coopératives et mutualistes d’épargne et de crédit, associations, sociétés de capitaux, etc. 

The 2016 Rural Development Report focuses on inclusive rural transformation as a central element of the global efforts to eliminate poverty and hunger, and build inclusive and sustainable societies for all. It analyses global, regional and national pathways of rural transformation, and suggests four categories into which most countries and regions fall, each with distinct objectives for rural development strategies to promote inclusive rural transformation: to adapt, to amplify, to accelerate, and a combination of them.