Initiatives and facilities

In developing countries, millions of micro, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs) don't have access to capital to grow their business. The demand for financing from smallholder farmers is estimated at US$170 billion in sub-Saharan Africa, South and South-East Asia, and Latin America.

Agricultural research is essential for sustainable and inclusive agricultural development. Research generates new technologies and improved policies which are essential for small-scale farmers who face the interconnected challenges of climate change, land degradation, gender biases, hunger and exploitation.

The China-IFAD South-South and Triangular Cooperation Facility was established in February 2018 and is the first Facility in IFAD dedicated to SSTC.

In response to the war in Ukraine, IFAD has set up the Crisis Response Initiative (CRI), which will protect livelihoods and build resilience in rural communities by addressing the urgent needs caused by the war while tapping into new market opportunities for small-scale producers.  

Given the magnitude of the challenge presented by this crisis, IFAD has launched a multi-donor COVID-19 Rural Poor Stimulus Facility (RPSF) to improve the resilience of rural livelihoods by ensuring timely access to inputs, information, markets and liquidity.

The Pacific Islands Rural and Agriculture Stimulus (PIRAS) Facility is a collaboration between IFAD and the Australian Government, and part of IFAD’s Rural Poor Stimulus Facility (RPSF). PIRAS is a regional initiative aiming to minimize the impact of COVID-19 on rural households. 

The Climate and Commodity Hedging to Enable Transformation (CACHET) is a financial solution designed to ensure revenue protection for smallholder farmers against climate-related disasters and price shocks. It aims at addressing two key challenges that are limiting the use of risk transfer mechanisms by smallholders: the lack of access and the limited sustainability of the existing schemes.

Risk and uncertainty are inherent to agriculture. The most common sources of risk are weather, climate, diseases, natural disasters, and market and environmental shocks. Other risks relate to logistics, infrastructure, public policy, the political situation and institutions. Some risks have become more severe in recent years due to climate change and the volatility of food prices.

IFAD’s INSURED programme (Insurance for Rural Resilience and Economic Development) aims to build the climate resilience of poor rural households, increase their capacity to manage climate risk and strengthen their livelihoods.

The International Land Coalition (ILC) is the largest and most diverse coalition working on land rights in the world.

In recent years, forced displacement has become a global problem of unprecedented scale, driven by conflict, violence, persecution and human rights violations. While the total number of displaced people reached an all-time high of nearly 60 million people in 2015, global attention has focused on the Near East and North Africa (NENA) region, where continued conflict and violence most acutely affect Iraq, Syria, Yemen and neighbouring countries. 

The Indigenous Peoples Assistance Facility (IPAF) is an innovative funding instrument that indigenous communities can use to find solutions to the challenges they face.

Over the past two decades, remittances have emerged as an important contribution to the well-being of migrant families and the development of communities of origin. 

Mali’s diaspora is 4 million strong, with 200,000 of these in Europe, primarily in France. The diaspora is key for Mali’s development, sending over US$1 billion in remittances in 2021 alone, making up almost 6 per cent of Mali’s GDP.

The Global Gender Transformative Approaches initiative for Women’s Land Rights is a global initiative with the overarching goal to promote and strengthen women’s land rights through the integration of gender transformative approaches (GTAs) in rural development interventions in Bangladesh, Colombia, Ethiopia, The Gambia, Kyrgyzstan, Niger and Uganda.

IFAD’s Gender Transformative Mechanism (GTM) aims to equip over 20 million rural people across 20 countries with the information and innovations they need to adapt to climate change by 2030.

JP RWEE is a global initiative with an overarching goal to secure rural women's livelihoods and rights in the context of sustainable development and address the key challenges faced by rural women in Ethiopia, Guatemala, Kyrgyzstan, Liberia, Nepal, Niger, and Rwanda.

Transparency is a transformational force. When citizens can easily access public information about the actions that affect their well-being, they are better equipped to hold their leaders accountable and to participate in the decisions that affect their lives.

IFAD and partners have established the NDA Partnership platform to promote policy dialogue, climate finance programming and capacity building for governmental officials acting as focal points for climate and environmental funds, namely the Green Climate Fund (GCF), the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the Adaptation Fund (AF).

The Rural Resilience Programme (2RP) is an innovative umbrella programme that will consolidate multiple sources of financing channeled to small-scale producers and their communities.

The Smallholder and Agri-SME Finance and Investment Network (SAFIN) is an inclusive partnership of actors operating in different parts of the ecosystem for agri-food and rural small and medium enterprise (SME) investment, with a focus on access to finance and complementary services.