The best way to make the desert bloom is to dig a hole. Not a well, but a shallow pit in the sandy soil about as wide as the length of your forearm. Then add some dung, plant your seeds, and wait for the rains.

The Financing Facility for Remittances (FFR) of IFAD is pleased to announce the 2020 National Calls for Proposals: Supporting Remittances in Times of Crisis in Africa.

A lot has happened over the last year – besides a global pandemic. See how much you were paying attention by taking our end of year quiz!

2020 has been a tumultuous year. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected everyone across the world – and meanwhile, the other challenges faced by rural people across the globe haven’t gone away.

In this episode, we say goodbye to a year that’s been full of uncertainty and change, but also adaptation, innovation and improvement.

This holiday season, some of the world’s poorest families in Somalia and Malawi look set to access water through innovative solar energy products financed through a crowdfunding project set up by IFAD.

Our Recipes for Change chefs Ska Moteane, Lance Seeto, Bela Gil, Pierre Thiam and Mariah Gladstone shared with us their festive wishes for the Recipes for Change community and IFAD in the holiday season.

To celebrate with all our readers and supporters and wish you Happy Holidays, we asked our Recipes for Change chefs to share some festive recipes to enjoy during the holiday season.

Our current food systems are not sustainable. Hunger has been on the rise for several years, with an estimated 811 million people worldwide going hungry in 2020 – and with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, up to 132 million more people are expected to join this number soon.

Benguerdane is a small town in the desert plain of El Ouara, a region in the extreme south-east of Tunisia, just a few kilometres away from the Libyan border. The climate there is forbiddingly arid, and the main source of livelihood is raising livestock like sheep and goats.

Despite the economic consequences of COVID-19, a growing number of countries around the world today stepped up their investments in long-term development, signalling a greater awareness of the links between hunger, inequality and instability which often spark humanitarian crises.

IFAD is joining with FAO and WFP - as well as the G5 Sahel and the Green Climate Fund to revitalize economic activities and food systems in the Group of Five Sahel countries and in the Republic of Senegal.

For countries like Bhutan – nestled in the high Himalayas, historically isolated and topographically challenging – ensuring food security is vital.

Poor rural people are among the hardest hit by climate change while contributing little to its causes. They deserve a fair share of climate finance to improve their resilience, and a seat at the table for the global climate talks.

Les députés français, Marion Lenne et Jean François Mbaye, membres de la commission des Affaires étrangères du parlement, en visite au Sénégal cette semaine, ont plaidé pour que le gouvernement français augmente sa contribution de manière significative à la douzième reconstitution des ressources du FIDA, qui se conclura en février 2021.

The Government of Mozambique and IFAD have officially launched the Inclusive Agri-Food Value Chain Development Programme (PROCAVA) to improve rural livelihoods, food security and resilience – are all critical needs in view of pandemic and climate change impacts for the country’s most vulnerable people.

At a time when hunger and poverty are increasing due to conflict, climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic, some of the world’s poorest countries are the first to pledge funds to the UN’s International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) to support its work to ensure that the most vulnerable rural people can sustainably access nutritious food and decent incomes.

In the face of a looming food crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Germany has committed funds to IFAD to help ensure small-scale farmers can continue growing food in some of the poorest regions of the world.

Today is World Soil Day, so let’s dwell a little on this amazing world of earthworms, mites, fungi and microbes.

The adoption of General Assembly resolution 72/279 in May 2018, triggered a consortium of UN organizations to come together and rethink how the United Nations Development System can deliver more coherent, accountable and effective support to help countries achieve the 2030 Agenda.