HIGHLIGHTS OF THE MONTH

·This issue focuses on access to finance. It includes two articles from the field (Kenya and El Salvador); reflections on WFP’s role in access to finance; details of WFP’s experience so far during the pilot; and news on P4P’s latest partnerships.

·WFP’s Executive Board has endorsed the Management Response to the recommendations of the Strategic Mid-Term Evaluation of P4P in mid-November. Broad support was voiced for the initiative. At the session, the Government of Belgium announced an additional contribution of €3.5 million for P4P implementation in Kabalo district, Katanga Province, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). This will allow the programme to reach 12,000 farm families (over 50,000 family members) in 2012 and into 2013.

·IFAD, OECD and WFP are jointly organising a side event during the High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan, South Korea on Thursday, 01 December: Agriculture, Food Security and Nutrition: Getting the results. The aim is to demonstrate - through concrete examples and country experiences - the challenges and benefits involved in developing national results frameworks and Managing for Development Results (MfDR) in agricultural development, as well as commitments to act on the lessons learnt. The Rwandan Ministry of Agriculture will discuss its experience in managing the multi-stakeholder “Common P4P” programme, which has expanded the P4P approach country-wide, with a commitment of the Government of Rwanda to procure 40% of national food reserve stocks from farmers’ organisations. The Ministry will make a presentation on the rationale behind the approach, the results expected, and how they are defined, measured, monitored and used in country systems.

·In preparation for the Third Global P4P Annual Review which will be held in Rome at IFAD headquarters from 28 November to 1 December, several pilot countries (including Burkina Faso, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Kenya and Rwanda) have held stakeholder meetings or lessons learned workshops to consult with partners. The December issue will highlight key conclusions from the Third Annual Review.

Kenya: First time finance for farmers

Before engaging with P4P, individual farmers in Kaptebee, in the Uasin Gishu District of western Kenya, had limited access to working capital. These farmers did not have access to credit through the formal banking system. In response to a P4P forward contract, the farmers organised into a producer group.

P4P partner AMPATH (Academic Model Providing Access to Healthcare), as part of its post-treatment support to HIV-affected households, provided training in organizational management and production to the Kaptebee group, specifically to access P4P. AMPATH also connected Kaptebee to Equity Bank, which provided loans to individual farmers to purchase inputs, as well as training in financial literacy. The loans were guaranteed by the new farmers’

organization so, from the bank's point of view, Value chain of Kaptebee Sach-Angwan Youth Group before and after P4P. Copyright: KIT. the risk was spread.

Prior to selling to WFP in 2009, the low prices offered by traders offered little incentive for farmers in Kaptebee to invest in production. Yields were low: six to ten bags per acre. WFP demanded an increase in quality from the farmers, gave training in maize grading and quality standards, post harvest and storage practices, and in turn offered a higher price. This encouraged the farmers to invest in better inputs (certified seeds) and cultivate more land. Yields rose to between seventeen and thirty bags per acre. The opportunity to sell to WFP through P4P contributed to developing the organization's ability to aggregate and market members' commodities. It also created access to finance for these farmers, for the first time in their lives.

“Being part of a group I went for a loan from Equity Bank. I bought topdressing fertilizer and my yields are increasing. I now produce seventeen bags – four more than the year before, and I am happy. Of these seventeen bags, I keep five for home, two to pay school fees, and I sold ten to WFP.” Rosaline, a member of the Kaptebee Sach-Angwan Youth Group.

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

Copyright: WFP/Charlie Barnwell.

Access to Finance: the story so far…

Through P4P, WFP hopes to leverage procurement contracts to address liquidity and financial challenges faced by smallholder farmers. Access to finance has been an identified constraint to development in all the pilot countries where P4P is being implemented.

Right from the start of P4P, country coordinators have been grappling with the issue of how to help increase access to finance for smallholder farmers’ organizations, within the limitations of WFP’s mandate.

With affordable credit and increased access to appropriate financing, more farmers will be able to realize the potential of their fields, and buy inputs such as fertilizer or improved seeds, and aggregate their produce, pay for transport and storage – all of which will ultimately increase yields and income.

Through its discussions with financial service providers across the pilot countries and partners working in the sector, WFP is building a picture of access to finance, and collecting this knowledge in order to improve programme design.

At the 2010 P4P Annual Review, it was recognised that providing financial services for agriculture in rural areas at affordable rates is extremely challenging, specifically in the case of staple food crops, and there is no single solution that fits all the different country situations.

What do we mean by Access to Finance?

Access to finance refers to the possibility that individuals or enterprises can access financial services, including credit, deposit, payment, insurance and other risk management services. Those who involuntarily have no or only limited access to financial services are referred to as the unbanked or under-banked, respectively.

What do we mean by Financial Service Providers?

Financial service providers in rural areas may include commercial and development banks, non-bank financial institutions, cooperatives, micro-finance institutions, semi- formal or non-formal organizations such as savings and credit cooperatives, self-help groups, village saving and loan associations. It also includes input supply traders and agro-processing companies.

Very often financial institutions do not lend in rural areas to smallholder farmers because of perceived risks including those risks related to price and production. Many P4P pilot countries have reported that farmers’ organizations have limited access to credit for commercialization (especially aggregation of commodities), working capital and cash flow at the farmer organization level. This makes commodity bulking and commercialization difficult, as cash poor farmers have no incentive to bring their produce to the farmers’ organization if they are not paid immediately on delivery.

This can have consequences in terms of delivery under contracts, as one of the P4P country coordinators noted: “We have found that lack of credit has been cited by farmers’ organizations as a leading reason for defaults on contracts, as farmers’ organizations which cannot pay their members at least a percentage of the value of the commodity delivered immediately have great difficulty convincing or incentivising members to bring their commodities to the cooperative in the first place. This is particularly the case in a situation of rising or unstable prices.”

One of the points of discussion was around how important it is that WFP remains aware of the moral hazard of encouraging smallholder farmers to assume debt. Indeed this was one of the key recommendations of the recent 2011 Mid-Term Evaluation of P4P. The precautionary principle “Do No Harm” finds special application in the realm of credit and crop failure.

Despite the challenges, P4P country coordinators found that a number of financing solutions were emerging across the pilot countries.

·There was positive experience in Burkina Faso where WFP forward contracts, with defined floor price, were used as collateral to enable farmers groups to access credit from a cooperative lender, Fédération des Caisses Populaires du Burkina.

·In Kenya, Equity Bank has been positive regarding the potential of P4P to improve access to credit of farmer groups and has “put their money where their mouth was”, including through extending input credits to smallholder farmer organizations selling to P4P. A key issue has been increasing the ability of farmers to operate bank accounts and improving their financial literacy through targeted technical assistance, in order to move from subsistence to commercial farming.

·In Zambia, revolving funds have been used successfully in a project implemented by P4P partner Dunavant (see here: http://www.wfp.org/videos/

helping-maize-farmers-get-ahead-zambia). A revolving fund for tractors and

shellers was set up and recorded a repayment rate of 100%. This was a viable option in the absence of access to financial services such as aggregation credit or input credits.

P4P intends to build on these positive experiences, and in this year’s Annual Review, there will be a dedicated session on forward contracts and linkage with financial service providers across all pilot countries. So far in 2011 we have heard:

·In Mali, farmers belonging to farmers’ organizations selling to WFP have been able to access credit from two microcredit organizations, Banque Nationale de Développement Agricole (BNDA) and Kafo Jiginew. This has allowed Bodina Bara, one women's group working with P4P the luxury of time, the ability to decide when to sell, and make profit for the first time, rather than being forced into a low-price sale to satisfy their immediate needs of food, taxes and medicines. The confidence shown in these women by P4P has in turn made them more attractive to institutions offering credit.

·In Mozambique, one farmers' federation, IKURU, has succeeded in securing credit from Barclays Bank on the strength of a WFP forward delivery contract for maize. This was after IKURU had received training in improving commodity management and handling techniques. Opportunity Bank of Mozambique has also advanced loans to farmers’ organizations selling to WFP.

The stark reality is that most poor people in the world still lack access to sustainable financial services, whether it is savings, credit, or insurance. The great challenge before us is to address the constraints that exclude people from full participation in the financial sector…. Together, we can and must build inclusive financial sectors that help people improve their lives.

Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary General, 2003

·In Rwanda, after collaboration with USAID’s post-harvest and storage project, a new financial product called the “merchandize loan” was introduced. It is a short-term loan issued against a purchase contract, without the requirement of collateral. Kenya Commercial Bank successfully piloted the first merchandize loan to Indakuki cooperative in Bugeser district, in order to facilitate delivery under the cooperatives’ contract with WFP under the P4P program.

·In Tanzania, P4P has engaged with savings and credit cooperatives (SACCOS), microcredit entities registered under the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Security and Cooperatives, established to promote savings and facilitating access to credit among rural households. Since P4P started, several SACCOS have received training from various supply side partners, including in improving quality of their produce, management and record keeping. CRDB Bank, National Microfinance Bank (NMB) and Standard Bank have advanced loans to several farmers’ organizations selling to WFP.

WFP’s role as convener

What has become clear so far, in the first three years of the P4P pilot, is WFP’s role in facilitang access to finance for smallholder farmers’ organizaons. P4P country coordinators worldwide have been communicang widely with farmers groups and lenders about the P4P demand pla!orm. But, crucially, WFP aims to promote independent relaonships between P4P vendors and financial service providers.

P4P vendors choose from whom they wish to receive financial services and WFP does not influence this decision. WFP works with P4P vendors in many ways: improving the quality of their product, facilitang aggregaon (including through invesng in warehouse receipts systems), buying from P4P vendors through forward contracts, and using dedicated partners to provide complementary technical assistance on financial literacy - in the process, P4P seeks to make smallholder farmers’ organisaons increasingly bankable.

“As a UN Programme, WFP must respect its procurement rules and not favour, nor appear to favour, any bank or supplier, in any of its arrangements; therefore WFP cannot and does not have a preferred financial services partner. […]

WFP’s commitment to buy is formalised in the purchase contract. WFP does not seek to make any representation to any financial services provider as to the capacity of the P4P vendor to deal with a loan or other financial product. WFP would NOT provide further commitments towards a bank lending in such a scenario. Within these limitations, WFP, through the P4P Access to Finance Working Group will continue to explore how it can facilitate innovative financing arrangements.”

From the P4P Steering Committee note

The P4P Steering Commi-ee has issued a detailed statement on P4P’s role in developing relaonships with financial service providers. Through P4P, WFP hopes to promote the commercialisaon of smallholder farmers’ organizaons, by buying from a group of vendors that historically have not sold to WFP. This makes a P4P food procurement contract a tool of development and we hope that together with the support of a diverse network of stakeholders, the P4P contracts will play a part in improving access to finance for smallholder farmers. WFP aims to be a convener, facilitang the introducon of P4P vendors to financial service providers, so that those two groups of actors may explore possibilies of agricultural financing and find what works for both.

Copyright: WFP/Charlie Barnwell.

Private sector financing and warehouse receipts

Standard Bank, in partnership with the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID), Kilimo Trust, Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) and Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) have created an innovative fund for Africa's smallholder farmers. The Agricultural Guarantee Fund Scheme was launched in March 2009 and aims to reach 750,000 farmers and small/medium sized enterprises in four countries: Ghana, Mozambique, Tanzania and Uganda. Standard Bank is making cash available for lending over three years, with the partners to the fund providing first loss and risk share guarantees. This partnership is the largest single financing facility targeting smallholder agriculture by any bank in Africa. A number of participating P4P farmers’ organizations have qualified for credit under this fund.

In Uganda, WFP has made investments in renovation of warehouses to promote market access for farmers through warehouse receipts. The Kapchorwa Commercial Farmers Association (KACOFA) and

Elshaday Kasese are two farmers’ organizations which have benefitted from this project, and operate, respectively, a 6,000 ton and a 2,000 ton warehouse. Stanbic Bank, a member of the Standard Bank Group, is in the process of finalising a multi-million loan portfolio to support the warehouse receipts system in Uganda. It is hoped that farmers who deposit crops of the required quality in the warehouses will be able to use the warehouse receipts they are issued as collateral for loans, which they would not have been able to obtain without the P4P investment in the warehousing facilities.

Agroways in Jinja is the most vibrant of all the warehouse receipts  systems facilities and is a business which has grown thanks to WFP's purchases – through P4P, just over 5,000 tons of grain have been purchased through this facility. Encouraged by the possibility of sales, deposits have risen gradually over the course of the P4P pilot, and other buyers are also now coming to purchase quality grain from the facility.

Tapping into networks and knowledge:

The Rural Finance Learning Centre

The Rural Finance Learning Centre (RFLC) is an internet-based resource that brings together a wide range of material in rural and agricultural finance. The RFLC is a website dedicated to providing access to materials for building capacity in the field of rural finance. The Centre aims to assist organizations, institutions, policy-makers, trainers and researchers who are keen to improve their own knowledge and that of others. The learning centre contains a reference library of documents and multi-media organised into topics which can be served from various perspectives: archived conference materials, background material, policy making, Service provision, client advice, distance learning, videos and online lessons. In conformity with the One-UN principle and the effort to ensure closer coordination among the Rome-based UN agencies, RFLC has been recognized by the entire industry as a good example of Knowledge Management in rural and agricultural finance. The RFLC is currently funded by FAO and IFAD as part of a project called "Improving Capacity Building in Rural Finance" (CABFIN). The project objective is to encourage wider access to the extensive resources which are available for capacity building and training in rural and agricultural finance. (See http://www.ruralfinance.org/)

The Rural Finance Network - Lessons from Kenya

The Rural Finance Network is a resource for development practitioners, sponsored by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the Swedish Cooperative Centre and ICA Africa. The fifth annual rural finance thematic workshop was organised in cooperation with the Government of Malawi, in Lilongwe, Malawi, between 28 and 30 September 2011. P4P Kenya country coordinator Martin Kabaluapa together with his colleagues Peter Kimotho and Zippy Mbati presented a paper, “Role of Markets in Rural Agricultural Financing in Kenya: A Case study on Smallholder Farmers and Traders involved in Grain Supply to WFP”.

The purpose of the paper was to share lessons drawn from the implementation of P4P in Kenya particularly in facilitating farmers and traders access to agricultural financing. The conclusion of the paper was the WFP market had improved the relationship between banks and borrowers who were P4P suppliers. These suppliers had been able to use the P4P contracts to access loans which they had used for inputs, which improved the quality and yield of each farmer, and encouraged buyers other than WFP to buy from them. Although new relationships had formed as a result of P4P, access to loans remained a challenge for farmers due to lack of information and late submission of loan applications. Overall, men had benefitted more from loans than women.

Inter agency cooperation

What has become equally clear so far is that cooperation between the P4P teams and other entities is vitally important in order to understand the nature of the financing constraints faced by smallholder farmers’ organizations. WFP is grateful especially to FAO and IFAD which have informed P4P thinking and are actively participating in P4P efforts in the area of access to finance, including by serving as permanent members of the Access to Finance Working Group.

Inter agency cooperation in Mozambique

In Mozambique, as part of the UN joint programme and under the framework of the One UN Fund, IFAD and WFP worked together to set up a guarantee fund which was finalised earlier this year. IFAD recommended GAPI as a professional private sector partner which could be responsible for issuing partial loan guarantees to facilitate loans to vendors selling to WFP under P4P. Meanwhile FAO provided training in post-harvest handling for all P4P targeted farmers’ organizations.

The P4P Access to Finance Working Group was set up by the P4P Coordination Unit in April 2011 in order to review and define WFP’s engagement with financial service providers in the context of P4P and consolidate country office experiences. Specifically it is tasked to provide guidance to country offices on how WFP can use its purchase contracts to address liquidity and financial challenges faced by smallholder/low-income farmers, and acts as an interface with the financial service providers interested in working with WFP in the context of P4P. The Working Group is comprised of representatives from WFP procurement, finance and treasury, legal, P4P coordination unit, regional programme advisor for Latin American Countries, representatives of FAO and IFAD.

New partners

·P4P is excited by the newest partnership, with the Development Credit Authority (DCA) of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). DCA has entered into partial credit guarantees with financial institutions worldwide to increase access to finance and advance the development goals of USAID. DCA has a history of active engagement in the African agriculture sector and shares P4P’s goal of facilitating the long-term commercial sustainability of the agriculture sector in Africa. The focus of the partnership will be to create incentives and risk mitigants that encourage financial institutions to provide working capital to smallholder farmers’ organizations (and other agriculture value chain actors) by combining WFP purchase contracts with DCA partial credit guarantees and technical assistance. USAID/DCA and WFP/P4P will be developing an action plan, selecting target countries, and performing joint assessments in the coming months. We look forward to this partnership and trust it will increase access to finance for WFP/P4P producers.

·COMPETE is the Competitiveness and Trade Expansion Program funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) East Africa regional bureau. COMPETE is designed to enhance economic growth and food security in Eastern and Central Africa by stimulating increased trade and competitiveness in both regional and global markets. In 2009, COMPETE began working with WFP on P4P in East Africa. Their mutual goal is to help smallholder farmers raise the quality of their product and integrate into agricultural markets.

COMPETE grantees trained farmers’ groups to improve their agricultural product and aggregate their surplus for sale to P4P. In October of 2009, a farmer group from COMPETE grantee, Cereal Growers Association (CGA), sold their first allotment, 150 metric tons, of maize to P4P. Since then, COMPETE grantees have been responsible for over half of the grain procured by P4P in Kenya. COMPETE grantees and technical advisors also work with P4P in Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Malawi. COMPETE farmer groups were proud to reach the quality levels that WFP demands and they benefitted from P4P’s willingness to provide temporary storage and transport. Still, in 2010 farmers’ groups started to default on P4P contracts with volatile prices impacting the market.

A major impediment to smallholder farmers’ organizations fulfilling their P4P contracts was side selling, which was driven by price fluctuations and the need for immediate cash. P4P prices were fair, but their uplift and payment could be slow. Farmer groups needed financing. In response to this, the COMPETE finance team introduced Purchase Order Finance (POF) to allow farmers to use their WFP contracts as collateral for financing. In 2011, a COMPETE-supported Kenyan farmer group, Marenyo Community Cereal Bank, signed a POF for KSH 2.1 million (USD 23,000) with Equity Bank for the purchase of 56 MT of beans against a contract issued by WFP. This was the first time that POF was used in a WFP contract purchase and stands to set a groundbreaking precedent for smallholder farmers’ organisations to get access to finance.

The COMPETE/P4P partnership is a dynamic relationship that will continue to evolve as both organizations strive to provide properly tailored products that will integrate smallholder farmers into more structured and formal markets.

Nestor Kazun addressing the P4P Annual Review. Copyright: WFP/Tobias Bauer.

Special report from Central America

P4P recently commissioned an independent study on access to finance focusing on

four countries in Central America:

El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. The conclusions are summarized here.

·Many smallholder farmers in Central America have too low a productivity to sell their crops to a formal buyer.

·Limited access to finance for quality inputs and for commercialization is at the root of the low productivity.

·Most farmers cannot afford quality seeds and fertilizers to be able to increase their yields. P4P is working with farmers and their organizations to help them overcome the challenges related to access to credit and other financial services.

As part of this process, P4P conducted at regional level a study to identify the main obstacles as help define a strategy to address funding and facilitate connections with financial institutions.

By analyzing the chain of basic grains and resource flows, it was found that the main funding needs are: (i) working capital for planting, maintenance and harvesting, which is mainly for individual farmers, and (ii) capital for commercialization which should be directed to farmers’ organizations.

The report found that any strategy aiming to help connect farmers and their organizations to formal financial service should seek to:

·strengthen the administrative capacity and financial management of the farmers’ organisations,

·identify and negotiate with different financial services providers,

·consider access to insurance against performance risk, and

·develop relationships between producers, suppliers, buyers and suppliers of financial services.

El Salvador: Benefits from managing a revolving fund

Nestor Cazun, president of the San Marcos Las Pozas cooperative, was one of several farmer representatives at this year’s P4P Annual Review in Rome. At the event, Nestor spoke about the experience of his cooperative with a revolving fund and accessing credit from banks.

San Marcos Las Pozas was founded in 2002, but remained inactive for a long time: “Before working with P4P, we had nothing. You could say that we were dead. Then they helped us to become more professional: we got our accounting and reporting systems into place, and started to get several trainings from P4P to build our capacity.”

As part of the initiative, a revolving fund of US$ 10,000 was established for the cooperative. P4P provided agricultural inputs such as seeds and fertilizers which were made available to farmers on credit. After the harvest, farmers were able to sell their maize to WFP and repay their loan which was used to establish the revolving fund.

Managing a revolving fund and credit helped the organization obtain a loan from a bank: “The experience gave us confidence and credibility. So, when P4P introduced us to banks, we could show that we have our accounting systems in

place. We got a US$ 30,000 loan from the Banco de Fomento Agropecuario (ACB) in 2010.” Nestor’s cooperative repaid that loan, and in 2011 secured another credit line of US$ 50,000. “We spent US$ 29,000 to finance inputs for our farmers, and the remaining US$ 21,000 for the marketing of our crops to be able to give our farmers some money when we aggregate their crops for cooperative marketing.”

Credit is crucial to help farmers access inputs at a time when many of them don’t have enough cash to buy good quality seeds or fertilizers. It also provides working capital to pay farmers as soon as they deliver the crop that the organization is aggregating for commercialization, rather than waiting until the final buyer pays the cooperative.

Nestor is confident about the future: “Whether WFP buys from us or not, we will be able to sell our crops, because we learned how to sell. We are already looking for new markets to sell to.” And Nestor believes that he and his fellow farmers can overcome challenges: “We still cannot supply big amounts. That is one reason why we hope to improve our post-harvest handling – until now, we do it manually. If we could use machines, we could handle much more and sell much more, too. We need to build the capacity to clean and store our maize and improve our quality. We would like to get a packaging machine to improve our marketing. With a packaging machine we could produce little bags of 1, 2 and 5 pounds to sell to the school feeding programme and individual consumers.”

After hearing about the P4P experiences in other countries at the Annual Review meeting, Nestor is even more encouraged: “P4P is very useful and we just have to continue improving.”

Meet Boubacar Ndaw, Senior Policy Advisor for P4P in West Africa

Boubacar Ndaw recently joined WFP’s Regional Bureau in Dakar as Senior Policy Advisor for P4P in West Africa. A Senegalese national and an economist, he has undertaken consultancies focussed on understanding smallholder commodity pricing structure and reinforcing capacity building.

Boubacar will work with regional institutions to enhance knowledge of P4P. He will also provide ad hoc technical support to country offices. Through P4P, WFP contributes to the objectives of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) and the West African Regional Common Agricultural Policy (ECOWAP) by increasing market access for small-scale

producers, and testing new market services, emerging warehouse receipts Boubacar gathering data in the field. systems, and commodity exchanges. He will focus on efforts to facilitate Copyright: WFP.

coordination and to enhance the technical capacity of ECOWAS in such matters, as a key and effective policy platform driving market and trade issues in the West African region.

KEY P4P CONTACTS IN ROME

P4P COORDINATION UNIT

·Ken Davies, P4P Coordinator: Ken.Davies@wfp.org

·Sarah Longford, Snr Programme Adviser, Partner- ships: Sarah.Longford@wfp.org

·Mary-Ellen McGroarty, Snr Programme Adviser for Ethiopia, Kenya, Laos, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda & Zambia:

Mary-Ellen.McGroarty@wfp.org

·Jorge Fanlo, Snr Programme Adviser for Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, DRC, Ghana, Liberia, Mali, Sierra Leone & South Sudan: Jorge.Fanlo@wfp.org

·Clare Mbizule: Snr Programme Adviser, M&E:

Clare.Mbizule@wfp.org

·Alessia De Caterina, M&E Officer:

Alessia.Decaterina@wfp.org

·Tobias Bauer, Communications Officer:

Tobias.Bauer@wfp.org

·Mark Lwanga Agoya, Reports Officer: Mark.Agoya@wfp.org

·Bhai Thapa, Finance Officer: Bhai.Thapa@wfp.org

·Ester Rapuano, Snr Finance Assistant.:

Ester.Rapuano@wfp.org

·Amanda Crossland, Snr Staff Assistant to P4P Coordinator: Amanda.Crossland@wfp.org

·Kathryn Bell, Admin. Assistant: Kathryn.Bell@wfp.org

PROCUREMENT DIVISION

·Bertrand Salvignol, Food Technologist: Bertrand.Salvignol@wfp.org

·Van Hoan Nguyen, Food Technologist: VanHoan.Nguyen@wfp.org

·Jeffrey Marzilli, P4P liaison: Jeffrey.Marzilli@wfp.org

·Laila Ahadi, Procurement Officer:

Laila.Ahadi@wfp.org

·Brigitte Labbe, Procurement Officer: Brigitte.Labbe@wfp.org

P4P Country Coordinators/Focal Points

Asia

Afghanistan: Henri Chouvel <henri.chouvel@wfp.org>Laos: Sengpaseuth<sengpaseuth.simmanivong@wfp.org>

Regional Bureau Focal Point: Francois Buratto<francois.buratto@wfp.org>

Eastern, Southern & Central Africa

Democratic Republic of Congo: Francis Bere<francis.bere@wfp.org>

Ethiopia: Enrico Pausilli <enrico.pausilli@wfp.org>Kenya: Martin Kabaluapa <martin.kabaluapa@wfp.org>Malawi: Mitsugu Hamai <mitsugu.hamai@wfp,org>Mozambique: Billy Mwiinga<billy.mwiinga@wfp.org>

Rwanda: Emmanuela Mashayo <emmanuela.mashayo@wfp.org>South Sudan: Marc Sauveur <marc.sauveur@wfp.org>Tanzania: Dominique Leclercq <dominique.leclercq@wfp.org>Uganda: Vincent Kiwanuka <vincent.kiwanuka@wfp.org>Zambia: Felix Edwards<felix.edwards@wfp.org>

Regional Bureau Focal Point: Simon Denhere<simon.denhere@wfp.org>

WFP’s secondee to ACTESA: Simon Dradri<simon.dradri@wfp.org>

West Africa

Burkina Faso: Veronique Sainte-Luce

Ghana: Hassan Abdelrazig <hassan.abdelrazig@wfp.org>Liberia: James Legg<james.legg@wfp.org>

Mali: Isabelle Mballa<isabelle.mballa@wfp.org>

Sierra Leone: Miyuki Yamashita<miyuki.yamashita@wfp.org>

Regional Bureau Focal Point: Jean-Martin Bauer<jean-martin.bauer@wfp.org>

Latin American & Caribbean

El Salvador: Hebert Lopez <hebert.lopez@wfp.org>Guatemala: Sheryl Schneider <sheryl.schneider@wfp.org>Honduras: Nacer Benalleg <nacer.benalleg@wfp.org>Nicaragua: Francisco Alvarado<francisco.alvarado@wfp.org>

Regional Bureau Focal Point: Laura Melo<laura.melo@wfp.org>

Eulogy - Chris Dowswell

The P4P team is deeply saddened by the untimely death of Christopher Dowswell, a founding member of P4P’s Technical Review Panel (TRP) and Executive Director for Programs for Sasakawa Africa Association (SAA). Chris died on Saturday 19 November 2011 in his home in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, as a result of health problems. He was 64 years old.

A US citizen, Chris was an agricultural economist by training, but worked mainly in agricultural communications and extension. He joined the Sasakawa Africa Association (SAA) in 1991 and for 31 years, he was aide de camp to Nobel Laureate Dr Norman Borlaug. Chris’ distinguished career also included positions at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) as well as at the International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) and Oregon State University.

Chris did his undergraduate studies at the University of Colorado and graduate studies at Colorado State University. He also served on the UN Millennium Hunger Task Force from 2002 to 2006 and Advisory Committee for IFPRI’s “Millions Fed” campaign in 2008-09. Since 2009, Chris had served on P4P’s TRP along with 9 other experts, providing strategic guidance to the P4P pilot programme. In early September, Chris participated in the 3rd annual TRP meeting in El Salvador, and as always provided critical inputs based on his vast expertise. Chris was also working on strengthening the cooperation between WFP and Sasakawa in Ethiopia, Mali and Uganda.

Chris cared deeply about people and devoted his life to development causes, particularly the fight against hunger and poverty. He will be greatly missed by colleagues and friends around the world.

My experience of Chris is that both professionally and personally he brought people together, based on a deep commitment to people and to the mission of reducing poverty in Africa. He had vast experience and keen judgment, knew what he believed and was quite unafraid to disagree, but worked to find and build bridges. A wonderful person and professional who will be greatly missed.

Dave Tschirley, Professor for International Development, Michigan State University.

Chris had this wonderful sense of appreciating development from the farmers' point of view, really a spokesman for them. His generosity with his time and his knowledge is a model for us all. And, although he spent much time in Africa, the highlands of Mexico and Central America were so very dear to him. His impact on our lives will remain for a long time.

Sheryl Schneider, P4P Country Coordinator, Guatemala.

Although I knew Chris for a very short period of time I became to admire him in many respects. One without doubt was his human side where his kindness and patience and commitment have become an inspiration for me. I always will be amazed of his ability to detect weaknesses and at the same time his capacity to suggest changes without making anyone upset. Technically I enjoyed talking to him and hearing his explanations, from calculating corn density per hectare to trying to figure out what a “manzana” meant in terms of final production. I think we have lost a great professional, but overall we also have lost a great friend and even a greatest human being … surely we will miss him!

Miguel Garcia, Director for Agribusiness Competitiveness, Interamerican Institute for Cooperation in Agriculture (IICA).

CALENDAR

·28 November – 1 December: Third Global P4P Annual Review, IFAD headquarters, Rome (28th November and 1st December internal to WFP and 29th-30th with stakeholders)

·28 November – 2 December: 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness, Side Event on “Agriculture, Food Security and Nutrition: Getting the Results”, Busan, Republic of Korea

·29 November – 1 December, NGO Annual Consultation, Rome

·2 December: Consultation on Post-Harvest Handling with Natural Resources Institute, WFP country coordinators and expert stakeholders, WFP Rome.

·6 December: Operational Briefing with Executive Board members: Highlights from the Global Annual Review, Rome

·14 – 15 Dec: Chatham House Conference on Food Security 2011: Transforming the Food Production System, Lon- don, UK

·17-19 January 2012, International Scientific Symposium on Food & Nutrition Security Information: From valid meas- urement to effective decision-making, FAO headquarters, Rome, Italy

The update is published by the P4P Coordination Unit in Rome, Italy. Contact us at wfp.p4p@wfp.org

External: www.wfp.org/p4p Internal: http://go.wfp.org/web/purchaseforprogress