Herramientas y Guías

El acceso a servicios modernos de energías renovables es un factor clave para erradicar la pobreza y garantizar la seguridad alimentaria. 

With the mounting awareness of the unmet demand for youth financial services and the growing evidence that serving young people is viable, there is also a need to assess and document the implications for rural areas. This toolkit on Youth Access to Rural Finance aims to contribute to filling that gap.
The Lessons Learned and How To Do Note on this topic provide IFAD country programme managers, project design teams and implementing partners with insights and key guidance on designing and offering appropriate financial services for rural youth. The toolkit on Youth Access to Rural Finance synthesizes best practices and offers examples from around the world.  

Although there have been improvements in YFS access, youth are still lagging significantly behind adults in being able to access financial tools. Across high- and low-income countries, young people are less likely than adults to have a formal account. There are even starker differences related to a country’s income level, with 21 per cent of youth in low-income economies having a formal account compared with 61 per cent in upper-middle-income economies (Demirguc-Kunt et al., 2013). 

Even with this data, determining the exact extent of youth access to financial services can be complicated because there is a lack of consistent data and definitions on youth (see Box 3). The lack of data is more limited for rural areas.
While there is some analysis of the urban-rural gap in access to financial services, with those living in cities significantly more likely to have an account than rural residents (Klapper, 2012), there are currently no comprehensive studies with disaggregated data for rural youth.

En 1977 el FIDA incluyó la mejora del “nivel de nutrición de las poblaciones más pobres de los países en desarrollo” entre los principales objetivos de su Convenio Constitutivo.

Desde entonces, los gobiernos, la sociedad civil y las organizaciones de desarrollo también han acabado reconociendo la importancia fundamental de la nutrición —que comprende la desnutrición, las carencias de micronutrientes y el sobrepeso— para el desarrollo.

La nutrición no es solamente un resultado del crecimiento económico, sino que, al mejorar el capital humano, es también un insumo esencial para el desarrollo económico y social. 

El agua tiene una importancia fundamental para el desarrollo humano, el medio ambiente y la economía. El acceso al agua y la seguridad hídrica son primordiales para mejorar la seguridad alimentaria, los ingresos y los medios de vida de las comunidades rurales. La falta de acceso seguro a los recursos hídricos es una gran limitación para millones de agricultores pobres, principalmente los que habitan en zonas de secano, pero también aquellos que realizan una agricultura de regadío. El cambio climático y los cambios que ocasiona en los patrones de las precipitaciones representan una amenaza para muchos otros
agricultores, quienes se encuentran en riesgo de perder la seguridad hídrica y caer nuevamente en la trampa de la pobreza. Por lo tanto, es preciso insistir en la necesidad de fortalecer la capacidad de las comunidades para adoptar y difundir las tecnologías de gestión del agua para uso agrícola.

El FIDA ha obtenido importantes resultados en la promoción de enfoques y procesos innovadores de incorporación de la perspectiva de género y favorables a las personas pobres en sus operaciones. 

In 2013, IFAD commissioned a study to analyse project management arrangements for market‑oriented smallholder agriculture. As IFAD adapts to the changing development discourse, the organization has focused increasingly on improving Project Management Unit (PMU) arrangements in order to provide more effective and expanded management and technical skills. This review was undertaken to evaluate the effectiveness of PMUs and their alignment with the Paris Declaration principles, as well as to identify lessons or frameworks to guide future project management and implementation arrangements. It investigated five case studies drawn from different regions and types of projects.  

El acceso equitativo a la tierra y la seguridad de la tenencia de los grupos objetivo del FIDA son fundamentales para el desarrollo rural y la erradicación de la pobreza. 

La producción ganadera en pequeña escala se basa principalmente en explotaciones familiares y es crucial para los medios de vida de las personas pobres de las zonas rurales, la seguridad alimentaria y la creación de empleo. Los animales proporcionan alimentos para el consumo familiar, productos para la generación de ingresos y dinero en efectivo que puede obtenerse rápidamente cuando se producen situaciones de emergencia y crisis externas (que pueden deberse a condiciones climáticas, casos de enfermedad, inestabilidad de los precios, etc.). Los animales son activos importantes que satisfacen diversas necesidades de los pequeños productores (proporcionan estiércol, fuerza de tiro y de carga, etc.) y tienen asimismo un valor cultural y espiritual. Las aves de corral y los pequeños rumiantes suelen estar a cargo de las mujeres y les proporcionan beneficios directos.

El FIDA, que hace más de cuatro decenios que lleva a cabo intervenciones relacionadas con los servicios financieros en las zonas rurales en más de 70 países y ya ha invertido USD 1 100 millones en iniciativas de ese tipo, tiene una gran y variada experiencia en esa esfera, una red mundial de asociados que trabajan en las innovaciones más avanzadas y cientos de proveedores distintos que atienden las necesidades financieras de los hogares pobres de las zonas rurales, que son sus clientes. Más de 3 000 millones de personas de las zonas rurales todavía viven con menos de USD 2 al día. Problemas como las crisis económicas, la carestía de alimentos y el cambio climático afectan a las personas pobres de una forma desproporcionada. Los hogares pobres de las zonas rurales suelen quedar excluidos de las posibilidades de operar en el sector financiero forma.

Procesos de ampliación de escala inteligentes en función del clima

La ventaja comparativa del FIDA reside en su experiencia en el trabajo a nivel de base, su comprensión de los obstáculos que afronta la población pobre en las zonas rurales, en particular los más vulnerables, y su capacidad de concebir enfoques integradores para el desarrollo económico y social. Un elemento fundamental del enfoque de desarrollo del FIDA consiste en la prestación de apoyo a las organizaciones de pequeños agricultores en zonas rurales como estrategia para el empoderamiento de la población rural pobre. Las organizaciones de pequeños agricultores sólidas e integradoras con un nutrido grupo de miembros son importantes asociadas de gobiernos, organizaciones no gubernamentales (ONG), donantes y agentes del sector privado que buscan nuevos mercados.

Taller regional de América Latina y el Caribe en preparación de la segunda reunión mundial del Foro de Pueblos Indígenas en el FIDA.

Africa Regional Workshop in preparation for the Second Global Meeting of the Indigenous Peoples’ Forum at IFAD.

This case study illustrates how the household approach for gender, HIV and AIDS mainstreaming has been used effectively in Malawi, highlighting how it has worked in a particular context. Links are provided to resources and online materials.

This note highlights the lessons learned in supporting smallholder institutions and organizations. 

The Twa “Pygmy” of the Republic of Burundi are a small minority of around 80,000 people that self-identify as indigenous and are considered as such by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the UN system. 

This How To Do Note guides design and country teams in conducting an initial analysis of organizations and their capacity development needs at the project design stage. It provides a conceptual framework and practical suggestions and tools to help practitioners systematically collate and summarize information captured during design missions. 

In February 2013, the First Global Meeting of the Indigenous Peoples Forum took place at the IFAD headquarters in Rome, in conjunction with the 36th session of the Governing Council. In attendance at this inaugural meeting were 31 indigenous people’s representatives from 25 countries in Asia, Pacific, Latin America, Africa and the Caribbean regions. Of the 19 Asia- Pacific regional representatives, two were from the Pacific; Mr. Anthony Wale, the Executive Director Aoke Langalanga Constituency Apex Association (ALCAA), and Ms Rufina Peter, Senior Research Officer at the PNG Institute of National Affairs.

During the meeting the Pacific representatives highlighted the need for the Pacific to have a “separate identity” as per the outcomes of Asia Pacific regional preparatory workshop in Bangkok. The issue was one of visibility for the Pacific Region due to its unique, rich and diverse cultures and traditions, its significant land and sea area and its high biodiversity. The Pacific Regional meeting proposed three action plans, of which the Pacific Regional Workshop in preparation of the Second Global Meeting of the Indigenous Peoples’ Forum at IFAD is a direct result.

This case study illustrates how the Chiefs and Traditional Leaders Household Methodology has been used effectively in Zambia, highlighting how it has worked in a particular context. Links are provided to resources and online materials.

This case study illustrates how Household Approach (household methodology) has been used effectively in Zambia, highlighting how it has worked in a particular context. Links are provided to resources and online materials.

The purpose of this Guide is to support institutional and organizational analysis and strengthening (IOA/S) for design and implementation of programmes and projects.
The Guide is designed to be a practical, hands-on set of directions to those needing to answer the following questions: “how to go about doing institutional and organizational analysis? And once I’ve done it, how do I go about using this analysis to promote sustainable institutions and organizations?”

This is intended as a user-friendly Guide, the use of which could help identify strategic partners and key areas for intervention at COSOP level; to deepen the COSOP analysis at the design stage by generating interventions that support sustainable institutions and organizations, and progress
at implementation stage should be easier to monitor and evaluate effectively. 

The “Strengthening smallholder institutions and organizations toolkit” provides valuable guidance to help practitioners analyze and address issues related to smallholder institutions and organizations during the devopment of country strategies and in the design and implementation of programmes and projects.

Natural resources (land, water, forests, fisheries) are fundamental to the survival of rural people. The livelihoods of most poor people depend on agriculture, which in turn hinges on the continued productiveness of the land and availability of water resources. Land and water, in addition to forests, offer the compendium of ecological goods and services that smallholders in developing countries need for their economic development; they can also provide a safety net in times of crisis. These resources are also global public goods. Natural resources need to be managed sustainably not only on smallholder farms and in individual sectors (e.g. selected sources of water or forest reserves) but in the totality of ecosystems that support their existence.

The indigenous population of the Republic of Congo (RC) include the Baka, Mbendjele, Mikaya, Luma, Gyeli, Twa and Babongo peoples. Depending on sources, these peoples represent a small minority of 1.25 to 10 percent of RC’s estimated population of 4.4 million, primarily of Bantu origin.

Esta publicación de Lecciones Aprendidas tiene como objetivo proporcionar a los equipos de diseño observaciones basadas en experiencias concretas provenientes de proyectos del FIDA y de otros donantes que puedan ser útiles para el diseño de proyectos de cadenas de valor. Este documento es parte de un conjunto de publicaciones (caja de herramientas) que incluye además un documento de Notas sobre el Diseño de Proyectos de Cadenas de Valor Agrícolas y un Cuadro General

The LOC is a loan to a participating financial institution (PFI) for on-lending to customers who are expected to repay their loans with interest.

Este estudio de caso ilustra cómo la Metodología para fomentar la transformación en los hogares se ha utilizado de manera eficaz en Etiopía, destacando cómo ha funcionado en un contexto particular.

This case study illustrates how the Men's Travelling Conference (household methodology) has been used effectively in Kenya, highlighting how it has worked in a particular context.  
 

This document highlights IFAD’s and other partners’ experiences with products, services, methods and approaches associated with Loan Guarantee Funds. It will assist IFAD’s country programme manager (CPM) to take up evidence-based good practices that can aid IFAD’s thematic focus.

This How To Do Note highlights the rationale for using Loan Guarantee Funds, focusing on different types of guarantee arrangements, as well as their strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. It also summarizes global experience with LGFs.

The Note provides country programme management teams, programme design teams, implementation teams, and other practitioners and users with evidence-based good practices and guidelines so that they can design and implement more effective and contextually appropriate guarantees. 

Community-based financial organizations (CBFOs) are often the only institutions available to provide basic financial services to the rural poor, especially in remote areas with inadequate infrastructure.

CBFOs can be organized in many different ways. This knowledge document elaborates on the lessons learned in designing and implementing support for a CBFO.

This how to do note addresses KPIs and PBAs at the level of partnering financial institutions. In this context, key performance targets are included in various documents, including strategic plans, business plans and possibly budgets at different levels. 

Also, they can be used as an important support instrument for results-based management.

This How To Do Note highlights the philosophy and rationale for LOCs, focusing on different types of LOC arrangements, as well as their strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. It summarizes global experience with LOCs in order to clearly outline when they should and should not be used. It presents practical aspects of specific approaches, methodologies and models that have been tested and can be recommended for
implementation and scaling up. 

This Lessons Learned note provides practical suggestions and guidelines to CPMs and the country programme management to help them design and implement programmes and projects. 

The purpose of this guidance is to provide CPMTs with some observations based on lessons learned from IFAD and other donors’ projects, as well as from the World Bank Operations Evaluation Department (OED 2006) LOC review that may help in the design of LOCs. 

This How To Do Note helps design teams to improve their understanding of different types of community-based financial organizations and the support structures they need to best serve remote poor rural communities.

This note provides an overview on Loan Guarantee Funds highlighting the main issues, challenges, opportunities and benefits.

This note provides an overview on IFAD's support to community-based financial organizations highlighting the main issues, challenges, opportunities and benefits.

This note provides an overview on key performance indicators and performance-based agreements highlighting the main issues, challenges, opportunities and benefits.

This case study illustrates how Household Mentoring has been used effectively in Uganda, highlighting how it has worked in a particular context. Links are provided to resources and online materials.

The toolkit on Household Methodologies (HHMs) is composed of three parts.

Strong links to markets for poor rural producers are essential to increasing agricultural income, generating economic growth in rural areas and reducing hunger and poverty. Every product that is sold locally, nationally or internationally is often part of an agricultural value chain (VC). From a development perspective, VCs are one of the instruments through which market forces can be harnessed to benefit poor rural women and men – not just producers, but wage earners, service providers and others.

This How To Do Note provides a description of the participatory land-use planning (PLUP) methodology with the steps that should be followed to implement it in IFAD interventions with some practical examples of how this has been done. 

This How To Do Note provides guidance on how to carry out a land assessment at the project design stage.

Through this assessment, it will be possible to identify key land tenure issues in the project area and to indicate how they can be resolved through project activities and interventions.

This How To Do Note provides guidance on how to carry out a land assessment at the RB-COSOP stage to provide indications on key land tenure issues that the country (or area of interest) is facing and how they could be strategically addressed to achieve the country’s strategic objectives. 

This note highlights lessons learned on pastoralism land rights and tenure aiming to inform the design and implementation of country strategies and projects from the point of view of land tenure issues faced by pastoralists.

It also provides examples of how IFAD has dealt with some of these issues through its programmes and projects.

Por tenencia de la tierra se entiende las normas, autoridades, instituciones, derechos y reglamentaciones que rigen el acceso a la tierra, su control y el de los recursos relacionados con ella. 

El FIDA siempre ha adoptado un enfoque proactivo para la focalización en la población rural pobre de todas las edades, con el objetivo de reducir las desigualdades sociales y económicas que favorecen la aparición y la perpetuación de la pobreza.

Hasta hace relativamente poco tiempo, la atención prestada a las necesidades y vulnerabilidades específicas de los jóvenes1 era escasa, debido a que no se les consideraba partes interesadas por derecho propio, sino beneficiarios subalternos e indirectos, y por tanto invisibles.

Esta percepción ha cambiado de forma radical y los proyectos financiados por el FIDA cada vez incluyen más disposiciones explícitas para el desarrollo en favor de los jóvenes.

Key performance indicators (KPIs) can be used in an IFAD-sponsored project to measure performance in a
regular and consistent manner. This note discusses the use of KPIs as well as the challenges associated with it. This discussion is followed by a review of the lessons learned by IFAD and other organizations, and concludes with strategic recommendations for follow-up.

GALS has been developed under Oxfam Novib’s (ON) Women’s Empowerment Mainstreaming and Networking (WEMAN) Programme since 2008 with local partners and Linda Mayoux. The use of GALS in value chain development (VCD) was piloted by ON and partners in Uganda through a small IFAD grant (2009- 2011). It was rolled out by ON with local partners in Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda with the support of a large IFAD grant (2011-2014) and in other countries with cofunding from other donors.

Las notas contienen herramientas para el diseño y la ejecución de proyectos basados en buenas prácticas que se han recogido de la experiencia en el terreno. Asimismo, proporcionan orientación a los equipos para aplicar recomendaciones específicas acerca de las políticas operativas del FIDA, los requisitos básicos para la realización de proyectos y los instrumentos de financiación. 

This note aims to inform the design and implementation of results-based country strategic opportunities programmes (RB-COSOPs) and projects by describing how youth are affected by insecurity of tenure and how such issues have been dealt with. It should be used at strategy, design and implementation stages.

The note explains the issues related to youth and land tenure and how they have been addressed in IFAD and other projects and programmes.

The objective of this Annual Progress Report is to review the activities of the Platform for Agricultural Risk Management (PARM) during its first year of life or, more precisely, thirteen months since its launch in December 2013.

MPAT was originally developed in China and India. In China, iterative testing was conducted in 2008 in order to refine and improve the draft Household and Village Surveys. After five rounds of testing in China and India, the project team felt that the surveys and indicators were sufficiently developed to warrant a large-scale pilot in both countries.

In China, the pilot was conducted in the context of an ongoing IFAD-supported project in Gansu Province in China’s arid north. The data from the pilots in China and India (see also Box 2 and Box 3) were then shared with the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre so they could conduct an independent evaluation of MPAT. Results from a pilot village in China are presented, together with a photo of farmers planting seeds below.

El Instrumento de evaluación de la pobreza multidimensional proporciona datos que pueden informar a todos los niveles de la toma de decisiones al ofrecer una comprensión más clara de la pobreza rural a nivel de los hogares y las aldeas. Como resultado, la MPAT puede reforzar significativamente la planificación, el diseño, el seguimiento y la evaluación de un proyecto, y contribuir así a la reducción de la pobreza rural.

Following an inclusive consultation and negotiation process, which involved more than 70 countries, international organizations, and representatives of the civil society and the private sector, the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGs) were officially endorsed by the Committee on World Food Security on 11 May 2012. The VGs set out principles, technical recommendations and practices for improving the governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forests. They promote secure tenure rights and equitable access to these resources as a means of eradicating hunger and poverty, supporting sustainable development and protecting the environment. They give recommendations to countries and to other key actors, who are strongly encouraged to adopt and use them on a voluntary basis.

La République du Niger a une population multi-ethnique, parmi laquelle, les Touareg, les Peulh et les Toubou s‘auto-identifient comme autochtones.

This technical note serves as a guide to the design of appropriate programme interventions that apply value chain financing approaches to the development of competitive agricultural value chains. 

It emphasizes interventions that promote financial inclusiveness and the overall development goals of governments, as well as those of technical and funding agencies.

This document is intended to aid delivery channels, microfinance providers in particular, in working with insurance companies to develop successful microinsurance products for the low-income market. 

A systematic new-product development process is crucial to the success of microinsurance products for many reasons, including: Saving money – by maximizing the potential for product success; Saving management and staff time – by ensuring, within reason, that the product has market demand, and by working out staff and systems issues early in the process, when it is easier and cheaper to make changes; Generating goodwill in one’s market – by offering products that will not have to be withdrawn or substantially altered once they are offered throughout the market. The process outlined in this manual will help microinsurance developers create successful microinsurance products. ‘Success’ means meeting the needs of the three major parties in the microinsurance relationship: low-income policyholders, the insurer and delivery channels.

This manual is intended as an aid to microinsurance institutions. It presents a technique called ‘process mapping’ that can support institutions in self-analysis by assisting them in understanding, developing and improving business processes. Although the concepts presented may be used for many types of projects and processes, this manual was specifically developed as a supplement to Microinsurance product development for microfinance providers (McCord 2012).

The manual describes how a process map can be drawn, analysed and adapted for the microinsurance sector. It offers practical guidance about which processes to concentrate on, and guides the reader through the task of improving these processes, first on paper and then in practice. For more information please click on the link below.

This technical note aims to help project designers and reviewers of the design process to decide whether matching grants are the most appropriate financing instrument in a given context and what to consider when designing a matching grant component. The note focuses on use of these grants to finance productive assets and investments for business purposes. For more information please click on the lonk below.

The United Republic of Tanzania (URT) has a multi-ethnic population with more than 125 different ethnic communities. Four of these—the Hadzabe, the Akie, the Maasai and the Barabaig—identify themselves as indigenous peoples. 

The Republic of Kenya has a multi-ethnic population, among which more than 25 communities identify as indigenous.

The DRC is a multi-ethnic country with some 250 ethnic groups, including several indigenous Pygmy groups.

Poor rural people in developing countries are vulnerable to a range of risks and constraints that impede their socio-economic development. Weather risk, in particular, is pervasive in agriculture. 

G20 leaders, meeting at their Seoul Summit in November 2010, requested FAO, IFAD, IMF, OECD, UNCTAD, WFP, the World Bank and the WTO to work with key stakeholders “to develop options for G20 consideration on how to better mitigate and manage the risks associated with the price volatility of food and other agriculture commodities, without distorting market behaviour, ultimately to protect the most vulnerable.” This mandate was part of a comprehensive Multi-Year Action Plan for Development, of which food security was one theme among several including infrastructure, human resource development, trade, private investment and job creation, and growth with resilience.

The objective of IFAD Decision Tools for Rural Finance is to provide decision-making support for the IFAD country programme managers (CPMs), consultants, project staff and technical advisers who develop and implement rural finance projects. Built on the IFAD Rural Finance Policy (RFP) (IFAD 2009), as well as other good practice guides, this knowledge management tool is designed to help identify and answer the questions that arise in each rural finance project, provide background on key issues, define common terms, highlight risks and opportunities, and provide references for further investigation. 

El riesgo es inherente a la agricultura. Los agricultores enfrentan una variedad de riesgos de producción y de mercado que hace que sus ingresos sean inestables e impredecibles de un año a otro. 

Guidance notes for institutional analysis in rural development programmes provides a synthesis of the training materials developed as part of the Institutional Analysis (IA) methodology. They propose that we rethink how we conceptualize and promote institutional change, particularly for pro-poor service delivery. 

They provide a framework and the analytical tools for designing programmes and projects that feature implementation modalities based on some of the core principles of good governance, focusing on “pro-poor governance” and systemic sustainability at the micro and meso levels.

As part of its obligations undertaken to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, IFAD committed itself to enabling the rural poor to help themselves out of poverty by increasing theirorganizational capacity to influence institutions of relevance to rural poverty reduction (policies, laws and regulations).

As a result, IFAD has embarked upon a process to strengthen its own organizational competencies in institutional analysis and dialogue.
This sourcebook is an attempt to complement and further this process. It has been written keeping in mind the needs of country programme managers, as well as consultants working with IFAD.