Project 07aa-4864 - agro-info

07aa-4864 Strengthening advocacy and enhancement of membership development

budget	€ 483.682,85	status	execution
start date	01-01-2007	date end	31-12-2008
location		country	south east asia
financer	Agriterra
executor	Asian Farmers Association for Sustainable Rural Development	intervention level	regional
Programmes	\| work area 04: Institutional Development (IS) \| IFAP 02: Focus development efforts on people and their organisations \|
description	In the next two years, AFA will become a key regional farmers' group articulating Asian small farmers' concerns and perspectives. Target institutions are (a) ASEAN on pro-small farmer regional integration processes; (b) WB on pro-small farmer empowerment processes; (c ) GATT-WTO-AoA on pro-small farmer global agricultural trade and ( (...more...)
description	In the next two years, AFA will become a key regional farmers' group articulating Asian small farmers' concerns and perspectives. Target institutions are (a) ASEAN on pro-small farmer regional integration processes; (b) WB on pro-small farmer empowerment processes; (c ) GATT-WTO-AoA on pro-small farmer global agricultural trade and ( d) IFAD on truly empowering farmers' forum processes. To enhance membership development and to build strong, capable, credible and far-reaching national farmers' organizations AFA wil organize leadership trainings and workshops and facilitate technology transfer between AFA members. The internal organisation will be strengthened by improving AFA's organizational systems and structures, enhance leadership and governance and strong coordination between and among members, secretariat and partners. (...less...)
results & observations	2008 marked the first year after AFA set up its own secretariat. The first semester of 2008 saw a lot of organisational and advocacy activities, highlighted by a general assembly and regional and international conferences. The second semester saw more activities carried out with members in their respective countries. It was (...more...)
final results & observations	2008 marked the first year after AFA set up its own secretariat. The first semester of 2008 saw a lot of organisational and advocacy activities, highlighted by a general assembly and regional and international conferences. The second semester saw more activities carried out with members in their respective countries. It was a time for visiting member organisations, implementing, monitoring and documenting technology transfer projects, conducting national consultations on agricultural trade situation, as well as organisational audits, and exchanging updates. It was also a time for developing new project proposals; one that includes a marketing component that is aimed at addressing an expressed need of the members (included in the 2009 project). At the same time, advocacy activities continued, with AFA preparing for the CSO activities parallel to the ASEAN summit in December 2008, which however was postponed to the following year, because of the problmes in Thailand. AFA also continued its engagements with target institutions and other CSOs, as it got invited to regional and international conferences. An issue paper on climate change got published, and a first draft of AFA’s video was produced. Reviewing the project’s 2-year objectives, the project consistently helped AFA to be recognised as a dynamic regional alliance of small men and women farmers in Asia that can put forward the concerns and interests of small men and women farmers through representations in various fora, consultations and several dialogues with national governments, regional government (ASEAN) and international institutions such as the UN, World Bank, FAO and IFAD. The project has increased knowledge and skills of members on some sustainable technologies, lobbying and advocacy, and organisational management. The project also helped AFA to establish a fully functional and independent secretariat. The AFA regional event, scheduled in December, dove-tailed with the ASEAN Leaders’ Summit, was postponed. Most of the preparations were already made when ASEAN postponed its summit due to political uncertainties in Thailand. Since AFA events are always timed with official or CSO events to maximise gains for such events, AFA decided to postpone its major event for this period. (...less...)
specialisms	\| Institutional development \|

	APPLICATION
	APPLICATION

	DEFINITION
	DEFINITION

	EXECUTION
	EXECUTION

	RESULTS
	RESULTS

	PROGRESS
	PROGRESS

	RELATIONS
	RELATIONS

PROPOSAL

Agri-agency	Own contribution executor	Other parties	Total requested budget
Agriterra	AFA
€ 0,00 + € 0,00	€ 0,00	€ 0,00	€ 315.115,00

The activities covered under this project will mostly be undertaken at the national level, although synchronized , coordinated and standardized at the regional level. This is part of the realization that when we advocate regional and international issues targetting international decision making bodies ( such as WTO and ASEAN), it will be best to engage the national governments first and try to influence from there. Lobbying and direct action at the regional level will add more pressure to the national governments. Sharing of information, analysis and strategies at the regional level can then make national advocacy efforts more effective.

GOALS

- to influence key national and intergovernmental regional and international decision making bodies on common agricultural issues affecting our members
- provide programs and services for our members in the area of alternative trade, agrarian reform and issue advocacy
- build strong, capable, credible, far-reaching national farmers' organizations
- strengthen AFA's organizational systems and structures

	Partner Sites
	Partner Sites