.
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) mark a renewed global commitment to eliminating poverty and injustice. Goal Seventeen recognizes that 21st century development requires revitalized partnerships for shared prosperity. Oxfam has joined with Swiss Re and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to create a dynamic public-private-people-partnership we call the Rural Resilience Initiative, or R4—a joint effort to help rural families build resilience against climate-related risk.
Over 1.2 billion people living in poverty depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Many live in areas hit hard by rapidly deteriorating conditions associated with climate change. Droughts are more frequent and severe, forcing vulnerable families to pull children out of school for more hands in the field, sell valuable assets, even forego meals.
R4 launched in 2010 to respond to this growing problem, building on the success of an earlier Oxfam program in Ethiopia. R4 combines Oxfam’s experience with community participation and local savings groups, Swiss Re’s innovative risk transfer solutions, and WFP’s global capacity, to offer four risk management approaches in combination: community risk reduction and natural resource management; livelihoods diversification and microcredit; savings; and microinsurance.
The core innovation of R4 is that it provides cash-poor farmers the option to work for their insurance premiums on projects that reduce risk and build climate resilience.
Farmers improve their food security, insurance companies gain new customers and markets, and safety net programs are strengthened through integration with savings and insurance. We are now testing and scaling up this integrated approach, in the process learning lessons to inform implementation of Goal Seventeen.
First, coordination is key. In Senegal, Oxfam and WFP leveraged USAID’s work on index insurance through Feed the Future (Naatal Mbay) to offer USAID’s products to additional farmers through R4.
Second, risk management strategies work better together. Farmers with insurance tend to take more risk and invest more in their agricultural production. Regular savings give farmers additional resilience to shocks. Rainfall harvesting helps conserve water in the long run, while weather index-insurance protects against drought in the short-run. And being able to pay premiums in labor rather than cash benefits farmers even when there is no payout—because the projects built further support agricultural productivity.
Third, communities that collaborate succeed. When a program includes the landless, single women head of households, and farmers who are better off, it helps participants ensure equal access to common assets through soft peer-pressure. Integration strengthens interpersonal bonds, community solidarity, and social capital. When the whole community has a stake, people are more likely to work together.
Fourth, the social protection paradigm is shifting from a model of “beneficiaries” passively receiving benefits, to community members jointly managing social protection mechanisms. In Senegal, social protection benefits are now considered a national investment rather than an expense, supporting farmers’ ability to contribute to growing the national economy.
Finally, the community benefits when women are full economic citizens. Women often have less access to land, credit, and hired labor, while they remain responsible for the well-being of their families. Yet the data show that when women have access to land and financial services, yields go up 20 to 30% for everyone. R4 enables women farmers to enhance productivity through services like hired labor they could not otherwise afford.
Working together, the private sector, local civil society, governments, and international organizations can spur the vibrant and inclusive economies needed to deliver the SDGs. Partnerships can help plug farmers into digital services that can give them spot prices, reliable weather forecasts, and better, cheaper credit, especially for women. Development finance institutions like the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation, which help attract private investment to support double or triple bottom line projects, complement investments made by governments and international aid donors.
Partnership-based development is not impossible: the systems exist, and the demand is clear.
These principles have made R4 a success. The US should keep the lessons learned through R4 in mind when planning the implementation of the Global Food Security Act, which became law with overwhelming bipartisan support this July.
There is no silver bullet. There is only cooperation and co-creation among every actor interested in ending hunger.
Editor’s Note: The feature was originally published in the 2016 Global Action Report, produced by Diplomatic Courier for the Global Action Platform. To read the full report visit: http://www.mazdigital.com/webreader/42981. Republished here with permission.
About the Author: Ray Offenheiser joined Oxfam America as its president in 1996. Under his leadership, Oxfam America has grown more than sevenfold, and repositioned itself in the US as an influential voice on international development and foreign policy.
Photo Caption and Credit: Medhin Reda and her daughter Tekleweini at their home in Tigray, Ethiopia. By Eva-Lotta Jansson.
First, coordination is key. In Senegal, Oxfam and WFP leveraged USAID’s work on index insurance through Feed the Future (Naatal Mbay) to offer USAID’s products to additional farmers through R4.
Second, risk management strategies work better together. Farmers with insurance tend to take more risk and invest more in their agricultural production. Regular savings give farmers additional resilience to shocks. Rainfall harvesting helps conserve water in the long run, while weather index-insurance protects against drought in the short-run. And being able to pay premiums in labor rather than cash benefits farmers even when there is no payout—because the projects built further support agricultural productivity.
Third, communities that collaborate succeed. When a program includes the landless, single women head of households, and farmers who are better off, it helps participants ensure equal access to common assets through soft peer-pressure. Integration strengthens interpersonal bonds, community solidarity, and social capital. When the whole community has a stake, people are more likely to work together.
Fourth, the social protection paradigm is shifting from a model of “beneficiaries” passively receiving benefits, to community members jointly managing social protection mechanisms. In Senegal, social protection benefits are now considered a national investment rather than an expense, supporting farmers’ ability to contribute to growing the national economy.
Finally, the community benefits when women are full economic citizens. Women often have less access to land, credit, and hired labor, while they remain responsible for the well-being of their families. Yet the data show that when women have access to land and financial services, yields go up 20 to 30% for everyone. R4 enables women farmers to enhance productivity through services like hired labor they could not otherwise afford.
Working together, the private sector, local civil society, governments, and international organizations can spur the vibrant and inclusive economies needed to deliver the SDGs. Partnerships can help plug farmers into digital services that can give them spot prices, reliable weather forecasts, and better, cheaper credit, especially for women. Development finance institutions like the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation, which help attract private investment to support double or triple bottom line projects, complement investments made by governments and international aid donors.
Partnership-based development is not impossible: the systems exist, and the demand is clear.
These principles have made R4 a success. The US should keep the lessons learned through R4 in mind when planning the implementation of the Global Food Security Act, which became law with overwhelming bipartisan support this July.
There is no silver bullet. There is only cooperation and co-creation among every actor interested in ending hunger.
Editor’s Note: The feature was originally published in the 2016 Global Action Report, produced by Diplomatic Courier for the Global Action Platform. To read the full report visit: http://www.mazdigital.com/webreader/42981. Republished here with permission.
About the Author: Ray Offenheiser joined Oxfam America as its president in 1996. Under his leadership, Oxfam America has grown more than sevenfold, and repositioned itself in the US as an influential voice on international development and foreign policy.
Photo Caption and Credit: Medhin Reda and her daughter Tekleweini at their home in Tigray, Ethiopia. By Eva-Lotta Jansson.The views presented in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of any other organization.
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Ending Global Hunger Through Private Sector, Civil Society and Government Collaboration
Medhin Reda and her daughter Tekleweini at their home in Tigray, Ethiopia. PHOTO: Eva-Lotta Jansson
Oxfam America and a host of partners are working on the Rural Resilience Initiative (also known as R4) which offers the poorest farmers a chance to buy weather insurance. For those too poor to have cash, they can pay for their premiums by working on community projects. The initiative also promotes a variety of tools that will help rural families build their resilience, including access to credit, encouragement to save, and steps to reduce the risk of disaster. The project began in Tigray with support from a local NGO, the Relief Society of Tigray (REST), but is now set to expand deeper into Ethiopia and into three new countries with the help of the World Food Programme.|
September 16, 2016
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) mark a renewed global commitment to eliminating poverty and injustice. Goal Seventeen recognizes that 21st century development requires revitalized partnerships for shared prosperity. Oxfam has joined with Swiss Re and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to create a dynamic public-private-people-partnership we call the Rural Resilience Initiative, or R4—a joint effort to help rural families build resilience against climate-related risk.
Over 1.2 billion people living in poverty depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Many live in areas hit hard by rapidly deteriorating conditions associated with climate change. Droughts are more frequent and severe, forcing vulnerable families to pull children out of school for more hands in the field, sell valuable assets, even forego meals.
R4 launched in 2010 to respond to this growing problem, building on the success of an earlier Oxfam program in Ethiopia. R4 combines Oxfam’s experience with community participation and local savings groups, Swiss Re’s innovative risk transfer solutions, and WFP’s global capacity, to offer four risk management approaches in combination: community risk reduction and natural resource management; livelihoods diversification and microcredit; savings; and microinsurance.
The core innovation of R4 is that it provides cash-poor farmers the option to work for their insurance premiums on projects that reduce risk and build climate resilience.
Farmers improve their food security, insurance companies gain new customers and markets, and safety net programs are strengthened through integration with savings and insurance. We are now testing and scaling up this integrated approach, in the process learning lessons to inform implementation of Goal Seventeen.
First, coordination is key. In Senegal, Oxfam and WFP leveraged USAID’s work on index insurance through Feed the Future (Naatal Mbay) to offer USAID’s products to additional farmers through R4.
Second, risk management strategies work better together. Farmers with insurance tend to take more risk and invest more in their agricultural production. Regular savings give farmers additional resilience to shocks. Rainfall harvesting helps conserve water in the long run, while weather index-insurance protects against drought in the short-run. And being able to pay premiums in labor rather than cash benefits farmers even when there is no payout—because the projects built further support agricultural productivity.
Third, communities that collaborate succeed. When a program includes the landless, single women head of households, and farmers who are better off, it helps participants ensure equal access to common assets through soft peer-pressure. Integration strengthens interpersonal bonds, community solidarity, and social capital. When the whole community has a stake, people are more likely to work together.
Fourth, the social protection paradigm is shifting from a model of “beneficiaries” passively receiving benefits, to community members jointly managing social protection mechanisms. In Senegal, social protection benefits are now considered a national investment rather than an expense, supporting farmers’ ability to contribute to growing the national economy.
Finally, the community benefits when women are full economic citizens. Women often have less access to land, credit, and hired labor, while they remain responsible for the well-being of their families. Yet the data show that when women have access to land and financial services, yields go up 20 to 30% for everyone. R4 enables women farmers to enhance productivity through services like hired labor they could not otherwise afford.
Working together, the private sector, local civil society, governments, and international organizations can spur the vibrant and inclusive economies needed to deliver the SDGs. Partnerships can help plug farmers into digital services that can give them spot prices, reliable weather forecasts, and better, cheaper credit, especially for women. Development finance institutions like the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation, which help attract private investment to support double or triple bottom line projects, complement investments made by governments and international aid donors.
Partnership-based development is not impossible: the systems exist, and the demand is clear.
These principles have made R4 a success. The US should keep the lessons learned through R4 in mind when planning the implementation of the Global Food Security Act, which became law with overwhelming bipartisan support this July.
There is no silver bullet. There is only cooperation and co-creation among every actor interested in ending hunger.
Editor’s Note: The feature was originally published in the 2016 Global Action Report, produced by Diplomatic Courier for the Global Action Platform. To read the full report visit: http://www.mazdigital.com/webreader/42981. Republished here with permission.
About the Author: Ray Offenheiser joined Oxfam America as its president in 1996. Under his leadership, Oxfam America has grown more than sevenfold, and repositioned itself in the US as an influential voice on international development and foreign policy.
Photo Caption and Credit: Medhin Reda and her daughter Tekleweini at their home in Tigray, Ethiopia. By Eva-Lotta Jansson.
First, coordination is key. In Senegal, Oxfam and WFP leveraged USAID’s work on index insurance through Feed the Future (Naatal Mbay) to offer USAID’s products to additional farmers through R4.
Second, risk management strategies work better together. Farmers with insurance tend to take more risk and invest more in their agricultural production. Regular savings give farmers additional resilience to shocks. Rainfall harvesting helps conserve water in the long run, while weather index-insurance protects against drought in the short-run. And being able to pay premiums in labor rather than cash benefits farmers even when there is no payout—because the projects built further support agricultural productivity.
Third, communities that collaborate succeed. When a program includes the landless, single women head of households, and farmers who are better off, it helps participants ensure equal access to common assets through soft peer-pressure. Integration strengthens interpersonal bonds, community solidarity, and social capital. When the whole community has a stake, people are more likely to work together.
Fourth, the social protection paradigm is shifting from a model of “beneficiaries” passively receiving benefits, to community members jointly managing social protection mechanisms. In Senegal, social protection benefits are now considered a national investment rather than an expense, supporting farmers’ ability to contribute to growing the national economy.
Finally, the community benefits when women are full economic citizens. Women often have less access to land, credit, and hired labor, while they remain responsible for the well-being of their families. Yet the data show that when women have access to land and financial services, yields go up 20 to 30% for everyone. R4 enables women farmers to enhance productivity through services like hired labor they could not otherwise afford.
Working together, the private sector, local civil society, governments, and international organizations can spur the vibrant and inclusive economies needed to deliver the SDGs. Partnerships can help plug farmers into digital services that can give them spot prices, reliable weather forecasts, and better, cheaper credit, especially for women. Development finance institutions like the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation, which help attract private investment to support double or triple bottom line projects, complement investments made by governments and international aid donors.
Partnership-based development is not impossible: the systems exist, and the demand is clear.
These principles have made R4 a success. The US should keep the lessons learned through R4 in mind when planning the implementation of the Global Food Security Act, which became law with overwhelming bipartisan support this July.
There is no silver bullet. There is only cooperation and co-creation among every actor interested in ending hunger.
Editor’s Note: The feature was originally published in the 2016 Global Action Report, produced by Diplomatic Courier for the Global Action Platform. To read the full report visit: http://www.mazdigital.com/webreader/42981. Republished here with permission.
About the Author: Ray Offenheiser joined Oxfam America as its president in 1996. Under his leadership, Oxfam America has grown more than sevenfold, and repositioned itself in the US as an influential voice on international development and foreign policy.
Photo Caption and Credit: Medhin Reda and her daughter Tekleweini at their home in Tigray, Ethiopia. By Eva-Lotta Jansson.The views presented in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of any other organization.
