In 1945, as governments were putting the final touches to their own network of international bodies, some of the major national farmers’ organizations laid plans to an international organization to represent them. With the creation of the United Nations system, and the FAO in particular, farmers wanted to be represented and heard on the international level. 

IFAP was founded in 1946, in London, UK. It was established to secure international cooperation of national organizations of agricultural producers “in meeting the nutritional and consumptive requirements of the peoples of the world and in improving the economic and social status of all who live by and on the land.” Thus IFAP had the twin objectives of working to assure world food and nutrition security on one hand and of assuring reasonable livelihoods for farm families on the other hand.

As with the United Nations family of organizations, membership in IFAP has evolved considerably since 1946. Developing countries have become the majority of the membership. IFAP’s Millennium Development Cooperation Initiative in 2000 also opened the way to many emerging farmers’ organizations from developing countries to join IFAP. This development cooperation initiative established a new IFAP membership structure, and saw the setting up of a movement-to-movement capacity-building program under which farmers’ organizations in industrialized countries help to strengthen the organizations of their colleagues in developing countries.

Initially preoccupied with the reconstruction of agriculture after the devastation of the Second World War, and guided by a strong belief in the philosophy of active international cooperation, IFAP has gradually shifted its emphasis as the farming sector has undergone major changes, particularly of productivity.  Government support for ‘international cooperation’ in the 1960s has given way to support for ‘international competition’ in the mid 1980s. This led to a change of emphasis in IFAP’s policy, moving from proposals for international commodity agreements to proposals on international rules for fair competition.

When it was founded, IFAP’s activities were exclusively at the global level, and the policy focus was on broad horizontal issues, like trade, the environment, and development. Today, IFAP’s has added to this core global activity, a regional committee structure and specialized committees and commodity groups.

Through the years, IFAP has stayed true to its principles of universality, democracy and mutual understanding. IFAP is entirely governed and financed by its member organizations.

There are 13 signatories to the Church House agreement, which established, signed in London, England, in May 1946. They were farm leaders from the following nations:

Australia

Belgium

Canada

Denmark

France

India

Luxembourg

Netherlands

New Zealand

Norway

Rhodesia (Zambia-Zimbabwe)

United Kingdom

United States of America