Platform for African – European Partnership in Agricultural Research for Development

Thursday, April 24, 2014

Institutional purchases to support family farming


23 April 2014. Brussels. This seminar organised by the Collectif Stratégies Alimentaires (CSA)  gathered farmers’ organizations from the South and the North, NGOs and agri-agencies as well as researchers and policy-makers. It gave the opportunity to consider the possibilities of supporting family farming through institutional purchases, the difficulties met by public-law bodies to get them, confronted to their bonds to their respect for the game of competition law, transparency and the risk of patronage.

Institutional purchases-Program (Document PDF - 401.5 kb).

The constraints were discussed that arise to the producers and to their organizations in order for them to be able to answer the institutional demand. They are numerous, quite particularly in the countries where the family producers’ access to the markets face difficulties.
  • The World Food program (WFP) has been using its position of important foodstuffs applicant to favor the development of agriculture in the beneficiary countries of its food aid (Purchase for progress, or P4P). 
  • In Wallonia, a platform is promoting procurement between communities and the Walloon producers 
  • The "Zero Hunger" program distributes farm products to the Brazilians who are in a situation of social and food vulnerability. It is the “Program of Acquisition of Food”, integrated in the “Zero Hunger program” that purchases the food at a remunerative price at family farmers’ level. It is probably one of the most accomplished programs on the subject that carefully targets the institutional
    purchases in order to support the family farming.
  • Annick SEZIBERA, General secretary of CAPAD (Confederation of the Associations of agricultural producers for development), presented its experience with the negotiation hurdles between CAPAD and the WFP/P4P program in Burundi
  • Jean Vettraino of Caritas France shared the document on Effets des interventions agricoles sur la nutrition: identifier et limiter les risques (15 pages, CIRAD/Action contre la Faim,10 Février 2014)
Research issues related to institutional purchases:
  • Aflatoxin contamination research
  • Improved storage research
WFP's Purchase for Progress (P4P) initiative is generating a wealth of information on connecting smallholder farmers to markets. As 2014 is an evaluation year for the pilot initiative which ended in 2013, this video shares important lessons learned and challenges identified to date.



Related resources:
Training Manual for Improving Grain Postharvest Handling and Storage.
July 2012, 248 pages

The materials in this manual serve as a basic tool for different levels of PHHS trainers working in different contexts and with different end users, with the objective of improving the quality of grain being offered for sale to WFP and other buyers. The manual includes detailed reference materials and technical guidance, PowerPoint presentations (available under the second link) as well as user-friendly posters for use in the field.

The manual was prepared by the Natural Resources Institute on behalf of WFP.
Powerpoint presentations
French version: Manuel de Formation pour l’Amélioration du Traitement et du Stockage des Grains Après-récolte


Structured Demand and Smallholder Farmers in Brazil: the Case of PAA and PNAE
October 2013. 35 pages.
The Centre of Excellence Against Hunger World Food Programme and the International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth of the United Nations Development Programme (IPC-IG/UNDP) launched last year the Technical Paper “Structured Demand and Smallholder farmers in Brazil: the case of PAA and PNAE”. The study brings findings on two general institutional food purchase programmes in Brazil, the Food Acquisition Program (PAA) and the National School Feeding Programme (PNAE), as well as unpublished results of the PNAE.

The study reveals that the PAA and PNAE together contributed to increased purchases made ​​by municipalities and local states directly from family farms. The two programs combined represent a potential demand of R$ 2 billion a year for the purchase of products of family farmers, which would have a great impact on the production and income of these farmers.

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