2016 ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development follow-up Round Table A: "A global framework for financing sustainable development"

2016 ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development follow-up

Round Table A

"A global framework for financing sustainable development"

 

By adopting the Sustainable Development Goals and the Addis Ababa Agenda for Action, the world has committed to ending poverty and hunger by 2030.

 

2015 - the concluding year for the Millennium Development Goals -  was a milestone in the eradication of hunger and malnutrition. For developing countries as a whole, the target to reduce the proportion of the world’s hungry by 50 percent was missed by a small margin. Today around 800 million people are still hungry. Now we need to act.

 

Where nearly 80 percent of the people living in extreme poverty live in rural areas, it is necessary to raise agricultural and agriculture-related rural incomes to end poverty and hunger.

 

As underlined in the section of the IATF inaugural report on   “Ending hunger and malnutrition”, the rural poor usually grow food, but not enough to rise from poverty or even to feed themselves year round. Poverty and hunger have similar causes and are often bound – and must therefore be tackled together.

 

We need to boost both private and public investment - particularly in rural areas - to raise agricultural productivity and incomes, and promote more productive, sustainable and inclusive food systems.

 

The rural poor are also the hardest hit by climate change threats. Investments in the agricultural sectors are crucial to building resilience and safeguarding income and food security.

Social protection in rural sectors is a key investment! When combined with other, more traditional supports, social protection can be the game-changer that drives inclusive development. It allows poor farmers, pastoralists, and fishers to take risks and try new, sustainable practices and accumulate the assets – including valuable knowledge - that reduce vulnerability and boost resilience and productivity.

 

 

We’ve already seen positive impacts:

 

• Social cash transfers in rural Ethiopia generated 5 times more extra economic activity than the same transfers in urban areas.

 

• A pilot social cash transfer programme in Zambia led to a 50 percent increase in the overall value of agricultural commodities recipients produced.

 

• Social protection programmes can also be based on public works, which help push up unskilled labor wages and can reduce worker exploitation in rural areas. Road-improvement projects in Bangladesh led to a 27 percent increase in agricultural wages and higher school attendance rates.

 

The Addis Agenda created a holistic and coherent framework for financing sustainable devel­opment. Putting it into action, along with the implementation of the SDGs, is critical to achieving the 2030 Agenda.

 

In this regard, FAO has three main messages:

1.Family farmers are key to poverty and hunger eradication.

 

90 percent of farms are run by an individual or family, producing over 80 percent of our food. Over 70 percent of family farms control about a hectare of land.

 

Small farms are, on average, more productive than large farms, make better use of natural resources, and contribute proportionately less to negative climate change impacts than their larger counterparts.

 

Farmers themselves, including family farmers, are by far the largest private investors in primary agriculture. In addition, investments by small family farmers are estimated to be proportionately at least three times larger than investments by all other agricultural sector actors combined. 

 

Yet, they face severe constraints: poor access to technology, inputs, markets and financial services; insecure property rights; vulnerability to agricultural risks; and market distortions or other institutional constraints stemming from inadequate policies and laws.

 

Moreover, rural women are generally the poorest of the poor, with very limited access to land, productive resources and services. Yet, over half of small-scale agricultural businesses are led by women. Let’s focus on their needs. Enabling investment often requires ensuring women’s access to land and other productive resources.

 2.We must combine social protection with other forms of public and private investment

 

Based on estimated investments required to eradicate hunger and poverty by 2030, FAO and the other Rome based agencies proposed in Addis Ababa a two-fold approach that combines public social protection with private efforts to raise investment levels, especially in rural areas and in agriculture.

 

Increasing aggregate investments fosters growth, by stimulating employment and incomes. As a result, the need for this kind of social protection extinguishes over time.

3.Meaningful private and public investment requires an enabling policy framework.

 

Reflecting the principles embedded in the new global framework for Financing for Development, we need policies that link development, humanitarian, and climate finance.

 

This requires good governance, complemented by effective partnerships, together with country level commitment and accountability.

 

New policy provisions must consider facilitating investment in nutrition and climate-sensitive agriculture, as well as processing, distribution, and marketing approaches that reduce food losses and waste. Green finance must be leveraged to boost sustainable food and agriculture systems.

 

FAO will assist countries in improving their policies and investment climate and will help building partnerships, especially by promoting and facilitating country-level multi-stakeholder public-private platforms to facilitate private investments and upscale development impact.

 

Global partnerships, such as the Global Soil Partnership, Global Livestock Agenda, Mountain Partnership, and the Global Alliance for Climate Smart Agriculture, are also important to support the achievement of the 2030 Agenda.

 

FAO recently partnered with Google Earth Outreach. Combining FAO technical expertise and Google mapping toolsets will help countries more effectively monitor their natural resources. FAO favours south-south and triangular cooperation, such as the National Food Supply Agency of Brazil (CONAB), with the ITAIPU binational enterprise and the Pan-American Association of Veterinary Sciences (PANVET), to strengthen institutional capacities. At the same time, public investments are also essential in all agricultural and nutrition-related research and technology development.To conclude, to achieve the new development agenda, the global framework for financing must bring synergies between climate change and the sustainable food and agriculture agenda.Let’s build the Zero Hunger Generation and pave the way to a sustainable and inclusive future that leaves no one behind.