"Now that I have a secure buyer, I will grow a lot more beans,” says one farmer who is benefitting from WFP's innovative Purchase for Progress (P4P) programme.
Connecting Farmers to markets
Purchasing food in the country where we have operations has been a WFP policy for many years. It's called 'local procurement'. While targeting the hunger needs of 102 million people in 2008, the United Nations World Food Programme bought US$ 1.1 billion worth of food in 73 developing countries.
Click on the image to download the P4P brochure in three languages.
Download the P4P fact sheet.
P4P builds on local procurement and takes it a step further. It enables smallholder and low-income farmers to supply food to WFP’s global operations and to gain more by doing so. P4P will give farmers the know-how and the tools to be competitive players in the agricultural marketplace. It will also put more cash directly into their pockets in return for their crops.
The majority of the world’s poorest people live in rural areas and most rely on farming for food and income. By helping hundreds of thousands of smallholder farmers gain access to reliable markets to sell their surplus crops at competitive prices, P4P bolsters fragile local economies.
Small farmers need secure markets for any surpluses they can produce. WFP will put in place new methods to purchase food and help reduce the risks they face. They include purchasing directly from farmers’ associations, using forward contracting and ensuring farmers get a fair payment for their produce.
P4P relies on a collective effort by governments, international agencies, the private sector and others key players. Partners specialized in enhancing agricultural productivity will help small-scale farmers to produce more food than their families need.
> P4P should provide substantial gains for at least 350,000 farmers in the pilot countries alone.
> The project will also identify and rigorously test practices that can be used to benefit small-scale farmers in other countries.
> Ultimately, the intention is to support farmers to capitalize not only on the market offered by WFP, but also to connect farmers to other local and regional food markets.
Where is P4P going to do this?
P4P initiatives will be piloted in up to 21 countries over the next five years. The countries in the P4P pilot include:
The food WFP buys from farmers will go to feed hungry people in the same country. Thus P4P creates a win-win solution for developing countries. In the first year, WFP expects to purchase 40,000 tons of food – enough to feed 250,000 people for a year - through the innovative methods launched by P4P.
Funding from foundations
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Howard G. Buffett Foundation have committed US$79 million to P4P. The Belgian Government has provided funds for the inclusion of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
P4P partners
WFP cannot do this alone. Its success depends on a network of partners in which public-private partnerships, such as the one with the foundations, are a key element. Governments are pivotal since the cash to pay for the local procurement of food comes from ongoing donor contributions to WFP’s regular operations. But so too are agricultural traders and agro-input suppliers.
What does P4P do?
- Creates an incentive for farmers to develop their crop management skills.
- Creates an incentive for farmers to produce quality foods.
- Creates a market for the surplus crops of smallholder and low-income farmers.
- Promotes local processing of foods.
- Realigns the way WFP buys food to better address the root causes of hunger.
