ISSUE 7
PURCHASE FOR PROGRESS ISSUE 49 OCTOBER UPDATE NEW TECHNOLOGIES OCTOBER 2012 Highlights: In many P4P countries technological advances in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) are making their way into agricultural development. This newsletter highlights three examples where new technologies are being utilised by farmers participating in the P4P pilot. The 39th Session of the Committee on World Food Security was held in Rome on 15-20 October. P4P was represented with a stand for the duration of the forum and was a topic of numerous discussions in both the opening sessions and side-events. During the Annual WFP NGO Partnership Consultation held in Rome in October, P4P hosted a luncheon for representatives of NGOs partnering with P4P. Despite the limited time, the luncheon demonstrated the active interest and engagement of NGOs with P4P at higher management levels and provided a preview for interesting discussions at the upcoming P4P Annual Consultation in January 2013. New USAID DCA guarantee agreements were signed in South Sudan, Kenya, Ethiopia and Tanzania. The Development Credit Authority (DCA) uses partial credit guarantees to mobilize local financing in developing countries. Guarantee agreements encourage private lenders to extend financing to underserved borrowers in new sectors and regions. P4P is working closely with the DCA in order to extend financing to P4P-supported Farmers’ Organisations. Rabobank is partnering with P4P in Rwanda to extend financial literacy training and marketing loans to cooperatives. Having begun as a cooperative to finance agricultural projects in the Netherlands, Rabobank has a strong agri-business focus. In Rwanda the bank is conducting financial literacy training for all P4P and Common P4P Cooperatives and offering short term marketing loans to finance aggregation and preparation of commodities for sale as well as small investment credits (trucks, small machinery). P4P on the radio in Ghana
P4P is supporting Farm Radio International in disseminating agricultural and market information to smallholder farmers in Ghana. Farm Radio is a new project designed to provide vital agricultural extension services through a designated FM radio station. Together with the Ghana Ministry of Agriculture, P4P is providing editorial support, for instance to the programming on post-harvest handling and regular updates on market prices.
The newest edition to the Farm Radio is the Freedom Fone, which allows anyone with a phone to access or contribute information on a specific issue 24 hours a day and seven days a week. It takes advantage of audio and text The Freedom Fone, in use throughout Ghana to address language and literacy barriers when reaching out to marginalized audiences that don't have access to other media. Farm Radio can be used to share audio information with farmers, organize a poll, collect SMSs from farmers and provides farmers with an opportunity to leave audio messages that serve as feedback for programs.
To make farmers more aware up upcoming broadcasts, the Farm Radio also sends out SMS alerts at a standard time with programme information, broadcast schedules, frequency and topics. Broadcasters from partner stations are given special training and resources such as Farm Radio scripts and online training to ensure that produced and broadcast programs meet set standards.
Selected and trained FO members will receive regular market information on their phones and share content with other members. The information is reproduced in audio and loaded onto the freedom phone to enable FOs 24 hour access.
Integrated into program production, broadcasts and feedback sessions, the phone-out and phone-in system allows farmers to contribute information to programs and broadcasters to produce high quality programs while minimizing cost and effort. Furthermore farmers can call the radio stations at specific times to ask agricultural extension experts questions free of charge. Recording equipment allows broadcasters to easily record field interviews featuring the voices of farmers. Given farmers’ general affinity for broadcasts with actual local farmer’s voices, the increased use of such interviews/ questions on air should result in better quality broadcasts that support and address farmer needs.
Farm Radio International is funded by the Government of Canada, with the support of the Ghana Ministry of Agriculture.
21 P4P pilot countries Asia: Afghanistan, Laos Africa: DRC, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Burkina Faso, Liberia, Mali, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia Central America: El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua Page 2 ISSUE 49 Malawi: Farmer Organisations sell their Maize On-Line
Connecting smallholders to markets is the main goal of P4P. One of the approaches WFP is testing is the potential of linking Farmers’ Organisations with commodity exchanges. In September, six farmers’ organisations from Malawi were invited to the capital Lilongwe to take part in a WFP online tender for 531 tons of maize.
For the past year P4P Malawi has been working with farmers’ organisations to improve their business mindset and their understanding of contract terms. Together with partners, P4P concentrated its capacity development support during the last six months on training to improve the ability of organisations to plan and deliver.
In August, P4P witnessed the first results of this strategy. The farmers’ organisation Mwandama, based in Zomba district in southern Malawi, independently bid for a WFP tender on the Agricultural Commodity Exchange for Africa (ACE) platform - and won. Farmers from Bua Mtete Cooperative enter The total amount of 19 tons of maize, valued at US$ 8,361, was successfully delivered their bids online. ©WFP/Leigh Hildyard to WFP. Following this, P4P decided to undertake a small experiment. In September 2012, P4P and the Malawi-based ACE held a bid-volume-only (BVO) session for 568 tons of maize with six farmers’ organisations. In a BVO tender, the buyer fixes the quantity he or she wants to purchase and receives price offers from interested sellers. WFP Malawi carries out most tendering opportunities on ACE through this reverse auction system.
For the session, representatives of the six farmers’ organizations were invited to place their bids on the ACE internet platform. Three of the twelve FO representatives were women, while female membership in their organizations makes up almost 40 percent.
“Connecting” farmers A year ago nobody, least of all the farmers themselves, would have imagined that they would be able to bid online. In the past, bidding would have been done by writing a bid on paper, placing it in an envelope and posting it to locked postbox. This method is easily understood by the P4P farmers and has been successfully done on several occasions.
For the new procedure, the farmers representatives were taken through exercises at the ACE offices that included setting realistic prices and profit margins and an introduction to how the ACE platform works. As all of the farmers’ present had never before used a computer, ACE rural trade facilitators assisted each farmer organisation present.
What stood out throughout the day was the amazement and excitement of everyone involved. Farmers, some of whom until that moment had never even touched a computer, learned how to use a password, how to use a mouse and the keyboard. These small instances of technological mastery mean much more than simple basic computer skills, they represent a new opportunity for farmers to independantly decide, plan and participate in the formal market economy. Macdonald German, a member of the Chandawe cooperative said: “I am very happy, I am learning. This was the first time I have ever worked on a computer and I know it is going to help us make good business.”
For WFP and partners’ staff, this day showed that given resources, training, inputs and time, the goal of improving farmers livelihoods through P4P is achievable in a very real and measurable way. However, it takes more than just this to achieve the goal of building the capacity of smallholder farmers to sell to institutional buyers and engage with the formal market.
For P4P Programme Officer Leigh Hildyard, “It takes belief, teamwork and a leap of faith from everyone involved. Of all the successes we have had over the past year, watching Mr Katcherenkhwanya, a 60 year old farmer from the farmers’ organisation Cheka, look on in stunned pride as his bid appeared on the main projector screen, is the most meaningful. I truly believe that in the very near future our farmers will bid from their own districts with minimal or no support from ourselves.”
The results of the BVO session were that five of the six organisations won contracts to deliver a total of 340 tons of maize for an average value of US$ 232 per ton. WFP will distribute the maize as part of its school meals programme.
Page 3 ISSUE 49
El Salvador: Farmers collect data for National Crop Monitoring System
In El Salvador, the P4P team is working with farmers’ organizations and the Ministry of Agriculture to establish a Crop Monitoring System (CMS). The system consists of an online platform that brings together and analyses data on how the production cycle of maize and beans is evolving. The system detects statistical irregularities that might threaten yields and gives warnings of impending crop failures.
The system relies on the expertise of Ministry of Agriculture technicians who gather crop information at municipal level every ten days from a sample of producers previously identified and trained. They monitor the P4P field staff and farmers discussing the Crop Monitoring type of seed for maize and beans used, amount of cultivated land, days System without rain, soil humidity, estimated yield and crop progress as well as crop conditions and other indicators.
The online application provides timely information about the production cycle which can be accessed by the Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources and Farmers’ Organizations, as well as many other government divisions related to agriculture and food security. The Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWSNET) is a key partner, providing satellite climate information that complements CMS reports. FEWSNET is also one of the main users and distributers of the information generated by the Crop Monitoring System. Crop Monitoring Areas of El Salvador
The information generated by the system helps government institutions in their policy and planning decision-making regarding the agriculture sector. Farmers’ organisations also benefit from the system as the government and other institutions are able to take immediate action when there is an alert of emerging threats during the growing season.
Currently, over 200 farmers and technicians – including both P4P-assisted farmers and others – have been trained to gather and feed raw data into the system. There is a plan to expand the Crop Monitoring System’s coverage to the key municipalities in the most important farming areas, and include a wide range of farmers’ organizations as part of the P4P initiative.
Introducing Djordje Vdovic, new P4P Country Coordinator in Afghanistan
Djordje joined WFP in 1993 as a national officer in his native Serbia during the Balkan War. He has worked in logistics and procurement divisions in Latin America and Africa, including as Head of Procurement in the DRC, when P4P started in that country.
Djordje holds an M.Sc. in mechanical engineering from the University of Belgrade. Before joining WFP, Djordje was a designer in a company that was producing agricultural equipment and harvesting machines. Djordje Vdovic upon his arrival in Afghanistan With regard to the P4P initiative in Afghanistan: “I trust that P4P is an excellent opportunity to tackle a number of problems at their roots, a pilot that allows for various approaches country by country, making P4P an economic growth project exceeding by far its original ideas described by the name “Purchase for Progress”. It is also a “Partnership for Progress”, which promotes a positive commercial climate and expand market opportunities for locally produced nutritious and quality foods.”
“While WFP’s P4P typically provides a market for agricultural products, in Afghanistan P4P is directly linking producers to processors, developing new products and local production capacities using domestic ingredients and contributing to the creation of Government food standards, with the ultimate goal for these activities to become commercially self- sustaining. So the key to progressing forward is reaching important strategic partnerships.”
For more information on P4P Afghanistan and processing, please see newsletter 46, July 2012 http://documents.wfp.org/stellent/groups/public/documents/special_initiatives/wfp250170.pdf
Page 4 ISSUE 49
KEY P4P CONTACTS IN ROME P4P Country Coordinators / Focal Points
P4P COORDINATION UNIT Asia Ken Davies, P4P Coordinator: [email protected] Afghanistan: Djordje Vdovic
[email protected] Edouard Nizeyimana, Snr Programme Advisor for Ethiopia, Eastern, Southern & Central Africa Kenya, Laos, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda Democratic Republic of Congo: Francis Bere
Ester Rapuano, Snr Finance Assistant: [email protected] West Africa Judy Gicharu, Snr. Admin Assistant: Burkina Faso: Veronique Sainte-Luce
New Video on the P4P website:
Empowering Rural Women in Guatemala: With the help of P4P, a group of women in rural Guatemala are learning to become successful commercial farmers, through new farming techniques and greater access to local markets.
http://www.wfp.org/videos/p4p-guatemala-empowering-women-and-cooperatives
CALENDAR SAVE THE DATE 12-14 November, WFP Executive Board, Rome, Italy 19 November, International Year of the Cooperative, Closing P4P ANNUAL CONSULTATION Ceremony, New York, USA 25 Nov. - 06 Dec. PAA Africa Missions to Ethiopia, Mali & Mozambique 29-30 January 2013 25-28 February, P4P Technical Review Panel Meeting, Rome, Italy FAO, Rome, Italy
The update is published by the P4P Coordination Unit in Rome, Italy. Contact us at [email protected]