32st Conference of the FAO
Remarks by Mr. Jack Wilkinson, President of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP)

Rome, 28 November – 10 December 2003

Mr. Chairman, Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is an honour for me to address this FAO Conference in my capacity as the President of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers, IFAP. IFAP is a federation of 105 national organisations of family farmers from 74 countries, and represents over 500 million farmers worldwide.

As a farmer, I was very disappointed to learn from the presentation of the World Food and Agricultural Situation that the number of people suffering from hunger and malnutrition has increased by 18 million over the last five years (from 1995-97 to 1999-2001). I was also disappointed that FAO sees little chance of meeting the World Food Summit goal and UN Millennium Development Goal of halving the number of persons suffering from hunger and malnutrition by 2015. FAO is the lead agency in fighting hunger, and in this regard I would encourage FAO not to follow the WHO with their misguided approach of ‘good foods’ versus ‘bad foods’. A goal of a ‘balanced diet for all’ should be FAO’s principle.

For farmers in IFAP, missing the global hunger reduction targets is not inevitable. They can be met if national governments and donor agencies decide to give agriculture and rural development the priority that it deserves. Agriculture is still not seen as a priority for actions on the ground in many countries, in spite of the fact that 70 percent of the poor live in rural areas, and in spite of the declarations of recent international conferences.

As a farm leader, I would also like to stress the key role that farmers’ organisations can play in mobilising the energies of farm families and farming communities worldwide in meeting this challenge.

In 2000, IFAP started a millennium initiative of its own under which farmers’ organisations in the industrialised countries help to strengthen the capacity of the farmers’ organisations of their colleagues in the developing countries. Our Federation has created it own development agency for small farmers called AgriCord. The plan is for AgriCord to have $30 million of funding available by 2005 for the building of farmers’ organisations capacity in developing countries. One priority area is to build farmers’ capacity for marketing and trade. This includes strengthening the ability of farm leaders to contribute to national and international discussions on WTO negotiations, building capacity for the setting up of farmer cooperatives and structures to create rural employment from local resources using local knowledge, and building capacity for formers’ organisations to speak for themselves.

Another, priority is in the area of knowledge sharing for preparing policy papers that reflect farmers’ views, in creating extension services, information systems etc.

We would like to thank the government of the Netherlands for supporting this initiative so that we were able to start this year; I would like to also thank the government of my own country Canada for having recently agreed to support the program too.

IFAP would like to invite FAO to be associated with this strengthening of rural producer capacity in the developing countries. In particular, we encourage FAO field staff to be proactive in seeking and establishing contact with farmers’ organisations.

Many governments will require assistance in this domain of involving stakeholders in their work. There is sometimes a lack of sufficient knowledge among government officials on the important contribution that farmers’ organisations can make to agricultural and rural development.

IFAP believes that FAO can contribute significantly in this field. We encourage FAO to include in its agricultural projects, or programs, an in-built budget line for the participation of farmers’ organizations. In some cases, this could be linked up to the IFAP program. Without such a budget line, projects can easily overlook farmers’ involvement.

There is a growing recognition of the importance of farmers’ organizations, and the necessity to increase their involvement in agricultural policies and programs. IFAP is convinced that this will make a difference to the poverty and hunger situation in the future.

It was therefore a shock for me as the IFAP President to learn that FAO has decided to dismantle its Cooperatives and Rural Organisations Group by the end of 2004. For farmers, it is imperative that this budget cut be reversed, or it will seriously damage the ability of FAO to provide technical support for cooperatives and rural organisations. This is a test of sincerity of FAO to practice what they preach. We hope that FAO member governments can agree to work to reverse this dismantling of the FAO Cooperatives and Rural Organisations Group.

Farmers’ organizations are not the miracle solution for solving all agricultural and rural problems. They are, however, the essential ingredient without which solutions cannot be found.

We look forward to building an even stronger partnership and cooperation among farmers’ organizations and governments, at local, national and global levels, including in the FAO International Alliance Against Hunger, in IFAD, and in our new initiative with NGOs and Norway, to meet the objective of sufficient resources to achieve the Millennium Goals.

Thank you.