GAFSP meeting summary: June 21

Report from June 21, 2010 Meeting of the GAFSP Steering Committee
Prepared by Neil Watkins, Interim Northern CSO Representative

The GAFSP held the third meeting of its steering committee on Monday, June 21, 2010. Representing CSOs were Neil Watkins for Northern CSOs and Mamadou Cissokho from the Pan African Farmer’s Alliance, sitting in for the Southern CSO rep Ndiogo Fall, who was ill and unable to travel to Washington.

The top-line outcomes of the meeting on issues of highest importance to CSOs were:

· The GAFSP SC approved in principle (but contingent on some modifications, approval by the Board of the supervising entities and another approval on a no-objection basis by GAFSP SC of the
Project Appraisal Document or its equivalent) $224 million in grants to 5 countries, including $50 million each to Rwanda, Bangladesh, and Sierra Leone; $39 million to Togo; and $35 million to Haiti.

· The GAFSP Coordination Unit will contact the recipient governments with news of in principle approval, and in the case of Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Togo, and Haiti, will also indicate a request from the GAFSP SC for the government to more strongly involve producer organizations in the development and implementation of the proposal.

· The GAFSP approved a budget of $170,000 to support Southern CSO participation in the GAFSP SC, including $48,000 for travel for each Southern CSO Board member and an adviser/support person to each Board meeting, $112,000 for staffing/communications costs total – or $56,000
for each Southern CSO delegation; and $10,000 for translation of key documents.

· The IFC presented new information about its plans for the Private Sector Window, and the PSW draft document will remain open for comments for two additional weeks.

More detail on each item follows on subsequent pages.

Detailed Report

I. Country Proposals – Round I

The majority of the time in the meeting was spent discussing the proposals from the 8 countries that submitted in time for the first window deadline. The result of the funding decisions can be found in the first attachment, titled "8 Country Proposals".

Some of the more relevant policy decisions taken include:

· -Fees for supervising entities were decided to be provided in addition to the amount of the country award, rather than as a part of it, and will not exceed 5% of the total grant, based on itemized expenses. For example, Rwanda will receive $50 million, and the up to $2.5 million in fees to the World Bank as the SE will come out of the overall GAFSP budget rather than out of the $50 million for Rwanda.

· -There was extensive discussion of the next steps after the “approval.” Several steering committee members wanted a very clear and black and white “approved/not approved” framework while others sought more of a contingent approval model, for a range of reasons relating to legal issues,concerns about environmental impact and civil society participation. After much debate, a compromise was agreed as follows: Countries will be notified that their grant is “approved” but specific comments/areas for improvement from both the ITAC and SC members will be sent back to countries along with the approval notice. Then the country will work with the identified supervising entity to incorporate the concerns/feedback into the Project Appraisal Document (PAD) or its equivalent. The project will then need to be approved by the Board of the Supervising entity. The PAD or its equivalent will also be re-submitted to the GAFSP SC for final approval on a no-objection basis.

· -There was also discussion of the need for more diversity among supervising entities given that the overwhelming number of proposals suggested the World Bank. As a result of this discussion, in several cases, multiple SEs were identified, such as the addition of IFAD as an SE in Togo as it was an IFAD project Togo was seeking to grow with its grant; and the IDB in Haiti, which was identified as a key investor in Haitian agriculture.

· -The civil society representatives repeatedly raised concerns about the lack of participation by farmers’ organizations in the preparation of and the plans for implementation in nearly all the
proposals. Based on these interventions, it was agreed by the SC that comments/instructions on issues of the importance of greater engagement with producer organizations be sent back to the countries for incorporation in their final project plans along with comments from the ITAC. The Southern CSO rep also repeatedly raised the need for coherence at the national level of this financing from GAFSP along with other financing operations including those of the WB and regional entities.

o Follow up: The GAFSP Coordination Unit have already sent comments about the need for greater participation by producers’ organizations in the development and
implementation of the proposals to each of the approved 5 countries. CSOs need
to discuss how to follow up on this opening to ensure more fleshed out
plans/engagement as the countries now work with the supervising entitites to
create Project Documents for approval by the SE board and final sign off by
GAFSP SC.

II. CSO Southern Delegations Budget – FY11

· The CSO representatives presented a more detailed budget request for support for the 2 Southern CSO Board members’ delegations from the GAFSP SC totaling $170,000 based on detailed input from Ndiogo Fall. Following discussion and questions by the SC, the detailed budget was approved as presented. (See second attachment, titled "Detailed GAFSP CSO Delegation Budget"). It was also noted that IFAD is currently working on a grant to support national platforms’ efforts in GAFSP countries to engage with the process.

· Follow up: The budget has been agreed but modalities must now be worked out with the World Bank regarding transfer of funds, how expenses are paid, etc. It is also now appropriate for 1 support person/adviser/alternate from each North and South CSO delegations to attend the next Board meeting. We should discuss and identify processes for selecting these people.

III. Discussion of Private Sector Window updated draft with IFC

· The IFC presented its updated Private Sector Window draft. They have addressed four issues since the last update:

· Coordination with other MDBs. Other MDBs can submit proposals from their pipelines for consideration of funding or co-investment by the IFC/private sector window.

· Coherence/relationship with the public sector window. Priority will be given to projects with active public sector window programs.

· Composition of the Project Appraisal Committee. They have been discussing the challenges of sharing confidential information they get from companies with the SC/PAC. They have agreed that they can share confidential info about individual investments proposed for the PSW with the contributing donors to the PSW. They are proposing as well that membership on the PAC be open only to donors to the PSW

· Cost recovery. This will be negotiated with the contributing donors directly.

· CSO reps raised a number of points with the IFC including: questions about accessibility of funds by small farmers; concerns about the restrictions of membership on the PAC; a desire for better
development indicators; and concerns about the proposed lack of transparency and the importance of all SC members being able to access information about proposed investments through the PSW, and the question of applicability of social/environmental safeguards to financial intermediaries and sub-projects.

· The IFC indicated that small farmers were a very important part of the new PSW, that there are a lot of tools – via FIs, aggregators, etc. that will allow us to them to target small farmers

· On transparency, the IFC indicated that it has its own internal guidelines on transparency that will be followed. Clients expect info to be delivered in a confidential manner. The IFC disclosure policies permit the disclosure of a project summary and economic/social review 30 days before Board consideration.

· On development indicators, they have the DOTS system, which tracks the development impacts of investments. They may start disclosing these, under review now.

· As for economic and social safeguards, these do apply to all IFC projects (A,B, and C types; FIs are C projects).

§ Follow up: Given the new information, we secured a commitment for the draft to open for an additional two week for further comments/input until it is finalized. Action item: CSOs should comment on the updated presentation
and identify any remaining issues by July 5.

IV. Other items

· Did not get to discussion item on role for Supervising entities on the SC. One SC member raised the issue, but without a concrete proposal. It was agreed membership on the SC would remain as is for now.

· Information on the Permanent TAC will be circulated by the Coordination Unit in July – with requests for input to the TOR, nominations, etc will in July, with a goal of virtual approval including budget by September.

· The Korean delegation approached CSO representatives about engagement with Korean CSOs. We should discuss this.

· The next in person meeting of the SC is envisioned for October 26 in Washington.

GAFSP meeting summary: June 21

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