APFP Challenge Fund

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

TO: All FOs (NFOs and SNFOs) within the national APFP Platform in Asia-Pacific.

The consortium Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development (AFA) and La Via Campesina (LVC) as the Regional Implementing Agency (RIA) of the Asia-Pacific Farmers’ Program (APFP) Project funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) invites all NFOs and SNFOs under its platform in Asia-Pacific to submit Proposals and Business Plans for funding support under the APFP Challenge Fund.

PROJECT BACKGROUND

The Asia-Pacific Farmers’ Program (APFP) builds on the coverage of the Medium-Term Cooperation Program Phase 2 (MTCP2). It is designed to target and reach farmers and rural producers, especially the smallholder and vulnerable farmers/producers through their farmers’ organizations. Specifically, the target groups are smallholder men and women farmers/producers who are members or interested to be members of local and national FOs in 29 countries. Also included in the target beneficiaries are smallholder farmer subgroups with the potential to become active economic players in emerging value chains supported by their FOs.

APFP’s Component 1–FO services development–aims to enable small farmers to access long-term professional services, and business services especially from their organizations, enabling them to gain a decent regular income and access to markets. One of the two core activities under this component is financing agribusiness partnerships. Under this activity, the APFP seeks to support FO business and capacity building plans by linking the FOs with private and financing sectors to finance the projects through co-financing or standalone financing.

For those FO proposals that are not able to source IFAD/EU regular program financing or other financial institutions, the APFP establishes the Challenge Fund to finance the seed capital required by these FOs for their business-related operations.

ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS OF POTENTIAL PROPONENTS

All FOs (NFOs and SNFOs) within the national APFP Platform in Asia-Pacific.

The Cooperatives/FOs, which express their interests to receive support from (NIA) and its partners, must submit their business proposal for expanding their businesses, and should meet the following requirements:

Must be a member of country farmers platform and have strong (Growth Chart not less than level 3) members based Coops/FOs in the country/region
They should be registered entities in their country (e.g. coop, FO, etc.)
Having a membership of at least150 for small countries like Mongolia and 300 for other countries;
Capable of co-finance the project of at least 30% of total project cost with its own funds;
Have a simple financial system (computerized system is preferred); and
Have qualified finance person in the organization.

ELIGIBLE PROJECTS

All related initiatives on improving the livelihood of farmer members through improved economic services of Farmer Organization (APFP Component 1) which may fall under two types:

Type 1: Innovative pilot projects that have proven to be successful within a limited scope, but require minimum additional capital to become demonstrative models and have the potential to be scaled up.

Type 2: Scaling up initiatives that are proven models and best practices in the fields of agricultural cooperative enterprise development. This may refer to proven successful initiatives that (i) can be extended to larger geographic areas or target groups; (ii) may result in a larger scope of products; or (iii) can become part of public development agendas as policies or country/regional programs.

Additionally, the projects should be able to show the following:

Ensure an incremental increase in income of farmers by at least USD 600 per annum.
Have at least 150 direct beneficiaries for small countries like Mongolia and at least 300 for other countries.
Have at least 40% female and 10% youth as part of the direct and indirect beneficiaries.

HOW TO APPLY

Proposals and business plans using the attached Simple Project Proposal Format should be submitted to your respective APFP National Implementing Agency (NIA) and the Regional Implementing Agency not later than 15 April 2021.

Email all the proposals/ business plan to your respective NIA Coordinators and for RIA send to the following email Addresses:

afalany@asianfarmers.org cc afajojo@asianfarmers.org, afaamir@asianfarmers.org, afamaru@asianfarmers.org, afaleo@asianfarmers.org, and afajunie@asianfarmers.org.

Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Development (AFA) and La Via Campesina (LVC)
Regional Implementing Agency (RIA)
Asia-Pacific Farmers Program (APFP)