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Advancing rural women’s empowerment
Gender equality and the empowerment of women are prerequisites for the eradication of poverty and hunger. First and foremost, gender inequalities and discrimination represent fundamental violations of the human rights of women. In addition, it is well recognized that gender inequality and discrimination undermine agricultural productivity globally,1 negatively impact children’s health and nutrition, and erode outcomes across social and economic development indicators.
Much work on rural women’s empowerment has focused on the need to expand women’s access to productive resources, which can allow them to increase their productivity. However, much more attention needs to be directed at underlying gender inequalities such as gender-biased institutions, social norms, and customs that negatively impact women’s work (paid and unpaid), livelihoods and well-being. Within food systems, these biases manifest themselves in limiting women’s access to productive resources, to services (such as finance and training), to commercial opportunities and social protection (including maternity protection). These manifestations may be regarded as symptoms, therefore, rather than drivers, of gender inequality.
The Nutrition Advantage: Harnessing nutrition co-benefits of climate-resilient agriculture
Climate change and malnutrition are among the greatest problems in the twentyfirst century; they are “wicked problems”, difficult to describe, with multiple causes, and no single solution.
Annual report on Investigation and Anticorruption Activities 2016
In 2016, the Office of Audit and Oversight (AUO) and its Investigation Section (IS) played a critical role in upholding IFAD’s zero-tolerance stance towards corruption, fraud and misconduct. AUO ensured a timely and effective response to alleged wrongdoing by completing its investigative actions for 56 complaints during the year – a closure rate much higher than in previous years – and generally ensuring a prompt and effective conclusion to issues.
Anticorruption awareness outreach was intensified through AUO participation in regional and other events, the pilot launch of an anticorruption e-learning module, celebration of International Anticorruption Day and increased coordination with the Financial Management Services Division (FMD), the Ethics Office (ETH) and the Programme Management Department (PMD). Investigative and sanctions processes were improved through revised procedures and AUO investigation capacity was strengthened through new forensic tools and segregated physical and IT environments.
Investing in rural people in Argentina
In Argentina, IFAD helps reduce rural poverty by investing in smallholder farmer organisations and indigenous communities to increase their income. The country programme strategy (2016-2021) is based on national priorities and has three strategic objectives focusing on income and strategic opportunities; human and social capital; and institutional development.
The strategy emphasizes the central role farmer and community organizations play in rural transformation processes. Key activities include:
• bolstering the economic sustainability of families and organizations by improving and diversifying productive activities, building resilience, improving their negotiating power in value chains, and promoting good nutritional practices
• strengthening the capacity of poor rural people and organizations by improving their managerial capacity, socio-economic condition, and their ability to engage in dialogue with the public sector
• building the capacity of government institutions to support rural development.
How to do note: Poverty targeting, gender equality and empowerment during project design
IFAD Results Series Issue 2
This issue presents and analyses experiences from the following IFAD-funded projects and programmes:
Ethiopia: Pastoral Community Development Project; Nepal: Leasehold Forestry and Livestock Programme; Palestine: Participatory Natural Resource Management Programme; Peru: Project for Strengthening Assets, Markets and Rural Development in the Northern Highlands (Sierra Norte); Sierra Leone: Rehabilitation and Community-based Poverty Reduction Project
Rules of procedure of the Executive Board (2017)
IFAD and you: delivering results
IFAD has a unique mandate and unmatched experience working in remote areas where others don’t go, and where poverty is most entrenched. IFAD-supported projects work directly with the most marginalized and disadvantaged people.
They focus on rural women, youth and indigenous communities. Our loans and grants enable developing countries to increase food production, create jobs and protect resources.
Research Series Issue 16 - Getting the most out of impact evaluation for learning, reporting and influence
Myanmar - Connecting rural people to knowledge, resources and markets
With Fostering Agricultural Revitalization in Myanmar (FARM), the first project it has financed in Myanmar, IFAD is scaling up the best parts of regional and global projects, both its own and those of other organizations. For example, FARM has introduced a new method to complement pre-existing extension services.
This is benefiting both farmers and landless microentrepreneurs across the project area. At the heart of FARM’s innovation is the establishment of Knowledge Centres (KCs). Built on the structure and network of public extension services, the KCs are staffed by a ministry extension worker – the KC Manager. The KC Manager brings together farmers and microentrepreneurs in common interest groups, and helps them make the most of newly available extension services.
Policy brief: Investing in rural livelihoods to eradicate poverty and create shared prosperity
Investing in inclusive and sustainable rural transformation is strategically important for the 2030 Agenda. This has been broadly recognized in debates about the SDGs, particularly the roles of sustainable agriculture, food security and nutrition in relation to SDG2, the eradication of hunger. It is important to recognize that the eradication of hunger is inseparable from the eradication of poverty in all its forms (SDG1).
While poverty is often the main driver of food insecurity and malnutrition, hunger and malnutrition also result in the inability to escape poverty. Investments targeted at rural people are needed not only to ensure no one is left behind, but also to unlock the catalytic role that inclusive rural transformation has been shown to play in reducing and eradicating poverty and hunger, as well as promoting wider prosperity.
Research Series Issue 15 - Remittances, growth and poverty reduction in Asia
Remittances have increased in low-income and lower- middle-income countries in recent years, playing an important role as a stable source of finance at the macro-level, and in poverty reduction at the micro-level.
Drawing on a critical review of the literature and econometric analyses based on cross-country panel data, this study examines the relationships among remittances, growth and poverty reduction in Asia and the Pacific and highlights policy implications to be considered by governments and policy-makers.
The Republic of Korea and IFAD: working for food security and rural development
IFAD and the 2030 Agenda: Transforming rural lives: building a prosperous and sustainable future for all
Despite much progress – extreme poverty has been halved since the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were adopted in 1990 – there are still 767 million extremely poor people in the world, and more than 75 per cent of them live in the rural areas of developing countries. Population increases and rising incomes are creating a growing demand for food, which creates both opportunities and challenges for people working in rural areas, including in smallholder agriculture and in the non-farm economy. Rising agricultural productivity, more jobs off the farm and migration are reshaping rural lives, but so too are climate change, environmental degradation, conflict and forced displacement.
IFAD’s experience in developing countries over the past 40 years clearly shows that investing in rural people leads to poverty reduction and economic growth that go beyond agriculture and rural areas. IFAD’s 2016 Rural Development Report presented evidence that inclusive and sustainable rural transformation is fundamental to economic and social growth, and to poverty reduction at the national level.
Policy brief: Promoting integrated and inclusive rural-urban dynamics and food systems
It is well recognized that with higher incomes and urbanization, patterns of demand for food change and expand – potentially creating new opportunities for food producers in many of today’s developing countries. It is not always equally well recognized that much of the urban expansion involves the growth of (often previously rural) towns, with these settlements retaining many of their rural characteristics.
The continued prevalence of small-scale farming in local livelihoods – albeit increasingly buttressed by increasingly dynamic non-farm sectors – remains a feature of many of these so-called “urban” settlements. Notably, small towns and cities of less than 500,000 inhabitants now represent the largest share of the global urban population, with the majority of the projected urban growth in the decades ahead to be absorbed by these centres.
Policy brief - Promoting integrated and inclusive rural-urban dynamics and food systems
IFAD Annual Report 2016
Learn about IFAD's work, investments and results in our 2016 Annual Report. Read stories about the rural women and men we empower, and get the facts and figures we share regularly with our Member States and partners. You can also learn more about our advocacy efforts to keep the needs of rural communities at the top of the international development agenda.
IFAD and the future - Striking at the roots of poverty and hunger
Famine, conflict, forced migration, poverty, hunger, inequality, drought, climate change.
To solve the greatest problems facing humanity, we must start at the bottom: with the underlying causes that are most difficult to alter, and with the most disadvantaged people who are most at risk and hardest to reach. These are the women and men who grow food, yet go hungry themselves: the small family farmers, traders, labourers, fishers, hunters and gatherers who are too often on the sidelines of modern value chains.
For four decades, only one organization has specialized in reaching these people. IFAD is that organization. A UN agency and an international financial institution – and the only such organization dedicated exclusively to rural areas. A people-centred organization that fights poverty and hunger hand-in-hand with families and communities. A fund that comes not just with advice and recommendations,
Remittances, investments and the Sustainable Development Goals: recommended actions
In 2015, Member States of the United Nations issued a call to action to eradicate global poverty, reduce economic inequality and place the world on a more sustainable pathway: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Research Series Issue 14 - Disbursement performance of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)
This paper investigates the trends and the influencing factors of IFAD’s project disbursement performance over the past 20 years. Based on data from 577 projects in 111 countries, the study finds that disbursement of funds are often delayed and time-consuming.
Using econometric analysis, the study assesses the internal and external factors affecting the amount and timeliness of disbursements, and provides important lessons on how international financial institutions such as IFAD can better monitor and manage this important aspect of their development effectiveness.