The International Land Coalition (ILC) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) have recently adopted a three-year roadmap to inform their collaboration and jointly contribute to more equitable rural transformation and resilient food systems by improving tenure security.
Over the past five years, IFAD has invested in tenure security measures in over 60 countries, in collaboration with several partners. The ILC Network is active in about half of those countries, which represents a great potential for country-level collaboration. The strengths of IFAD and ILC partnership reside in their complementarities, which reduces overlaps and promotes efficiency. Building on this complementarity, the partnerships between IFAD and ILC can improve the efficacy of land tenure interventions, leading to substantial progress in improving tenure security for rural people.
The relationship is mutually beneficial; the ILC network can make significant contributions to IFAD's investments, especially at the country level, to promote inclusive land governance. On the other hand, IFAD-supported projects provide opportunities to expand multi-stakeholder involvement for the ILC Network, by demonstrating alternative approaches to participatory policy dialogue. At the global level, partnerships allow for joint advocacy on securing tenure of land and the dissemination of knowledge. Ultimately, the IFAD-ILC Partnership aims at securing land tenure, as a first necessary step to invest in rural prosperity and resilience to fight poverty and hunger towards the realisation of the SDGs.
Recognizing the mutual benefit of greater collaboration and the importance of fostering synergies, IFAD’s Land Tenure Desk (IFAD LTD) and the ILC Secretariat and Regional Coordination Units (ILC One Team) have continuously promoted joint programming, innovation and policy engagement between ILC supported platforms and members with IFAD regional and country teams, and other divisions.
In 2019, an initiative to strengthen IFAD – ILC collaboration was launched jointly by the two parties. It started by conducting a desk review of IFAD’s portfolio and ILC-supported initiatives to develop collaboration and joint programming. The exercise resulted in a matrix of concrete, overlapping ILC-IFAD operations. The matrix was informed by IFAD colleagues with key roles in thematic areas where land is a cross-cutting issue, such as climate change, environment, gender, youth, or indigenous people.
Early in 2020, IFAD Land Tenure Desk and the ILC’s One Team re-doubled efforts at strengthening the joint programming between regional divisions and other ILC members. This included meetings with all SKD and PMD Directors, Regional Economists, Portfolio Advisers, and joint engagements with certain Hub Directors and IFAD Country Offices. The extended institutional dialogue between SKD and PMD divisions and the ILC One Team informed the development a of three-year Roadmap (2020-2022) for increasing collaboration between IFAD’s thematic and operational divisions and the ILC network.
Approved by IFAD directors at the PMC meeting on the 7th of July, the operational document complements existing instruments that formalise IFAD and ILC long-lasting partnership, namely IFAD membership to the International Coalition since its creation in 1995, including its biannual contribution, and the recently renewed hosting agreement running until 2030.
This roadmap aims to concretise IFAD-ILC collaboration for the operationalisation of targeted activities, with a systemic approach to enhancing joint impact through securing land rights for rural transformation and resilience. The partnership is embedded in ILC and IFAD’s operational modality and is structured around three operational objectives, relating to ILC and IFAD SKD & PMD corporate goals:
- Sustainable country-level impact at scale, through policy dialogue & technical support
- Global and Regional policy engagement, and thematic program support across countries
- Knowledge and data generation, innovation, and dissemination of good practices
To achieve the objectives, significant effort will be put in consolidating regional and thematic dynamics to allow IFAD and ILC to benefit from the central coordination and make progress on the 19 activities identified. For the operationalisation of the activities, the roadmap strongly relies on diverse stakeholders at various levels, building ownership and agreeing on the roles and responsibilities, which is essential to ensure results and long-term impacts. To this end, the next phase consists of establishing mechanisms and agreeing on the roles and responsibilities to sustain the dialogue and move forward with concrete collaborations with the full support of key stakeholders.
Finally, the roadmap will be reviewed on a yearly basis during an annual planning meeting to assess the state of specific targets, activities, the timeline, and the expected outcomes. In addition to the above, the roadmap will be supported by continuous monitoring interventions, such as joint participation at thematic, regional and country initiatives’ assessment; and regular coordination meetings.
If you are interested to know more about IFAD & ILC Strategic Partnership or the Roadmap, please contact Jimmy Gaudin.