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Building Sustainable Partnerships for the Implementation of Responsible Investments in Agricultural Land
General
The SPIRAL-Project aimed to test and further develop the concept of the Cocoa Production Cluster (CPC) as a responsible approach to investment in agricultural land in Sierra Leone. The CPC model aimed to retain land under customary ownership throughout, without reducing community land access for food production and provide secure tenure rights for the cocoa farmers recruited, while ensuring improved cocoa production, sustainable land management and a sustainable income stream. WHH also planned that the CPC model would inform national policy development on responsible agricultural investment, with a view to wider adoption of the model. The project also sought to establish a foundation for a longer-term effort to develop a community-owned cocoa enterprise. The aim was to go beyond existing ‘block farming’ models for improved cocoa production, in which cocoa traders provide inputs and cocoa offtake services to enable groups of smallholder producers to sell into export markets, in return for a share of the crop. The aspirational CPC model envisaged an agribusiness fully compliant with VGGT principles, to be incubated with the support of a business partner acting as farm manager holding clusters of cocoa production sites released by neighbouring land holding families. The farm manager would be responsible for improved production by locally recruited workers, farmer training, and business management for an initial period of 15 years, following 4 years for crop establishment under a revenue sharing arrangement with the landowners and workers. The plan was then to divide the land into small scale commercial farming divisions for allocation to selected workers and master farmers to manage operations for a further 15 years, during which the farm manager would gradually withdraw whole remaining as trustee, and to transfer the business as a whole into community ownership at the end. The project had four target investment areas comprising 13 villages located in three Chiefdoms of Dea, Luawa, and Kpeje Bongre (all in Kailahun District). The original business partner was BALMED, a local Sierra Leonean cocoa trader also engaged in the block farming approach. For an explanation of the CPC model and the project’s overall goals see WHH’s Spiral project brief. WHH also produced a summary comparison of main features of Cocoa Block farming as practiced in Sierra Leone with those of the proposed CPC model. During the project, WHH also commissioned an investigation into existing and potential alternative business models for agri business development in Sierra Leone by researcher Raoul Hermann: report available here. Without sufficient incentives or guarantees of returns for long term engagement, BALMED unfortunately decided to withdraw from the project after almost two years, citing difficulties of access to the investment target areas, higher than anticipated labour supervision costs, and inability to meet community requests including assistance in construction of access roads. Without a business partner the CPC model was not viable, so WHH assumed temporary and partial responsibility as stand-in s agri-business operator to take forward implementation of the project. As this created a potential conflict of interest for WHH as an NGO working on behalf of the community, WHH opted to create an independent social agri-business and made contacts with potential financiers, cocoa off-takers, and manufacturers to pitch the CPC model and raise investment funds. In view of this abrupt change, and following a field assessment mission to review options, LEGEND decided to fund a project exit strategy that included completion of the ongoing work judged to be useful in the national context, but falling short of original project ambitions and discontinuing activities which required active contribution of a business partner. This included: A participatory land tenure assessment and participatory land use planning exercise in 4 villages, to test and demonstrate methodologies to understand complex customary tenure rules and practices involving both women and men from amongst land owning families, family members and other community land users and stakeholders. Full report and guide to the methods adopted available here. Development and agreement of a detailed land lease agreement template, undertaken by legal support NGO Namati, for land released to the company by the participating communities and land holding families and the returns expected from the company. Because of the exit of the original business partner and the risks involved in this continuing long -term agribusiness development venture, LEGEND decided not to support WHH’s new strategy to develop the project by setting up its own company. With its own funds and initiative, WHH has since registered a spin-off company called ‘Lizard Earth’ to act as a new business partner to provide farm management services. It has also retained Namati’s services to negotiate and adapt the land lease template to requirements of the local community land owners in each participating village. Lizard Earth will then lease the land and act as trustee, temporary land owner and farm manager during the first phase. For details of the new social agribusiness company objectives and aspirations: see the Lizard Earth company presentation. Grantee’s products and project documentation The SPIRAL Project Brief Alternative Agricultural Business models for Large-scale Private Investments in Sierra Leone Land tenure & Participatory Land Use Planning Assessment Report & Guide The Block Farm and the CPC Model : Comparison of Two Responsible Investment Approaches
A New Approach to Land Tenure and Sustainability Verification: Measuring and Certifying Performance in the Sug
General
Working in collaboration with TMP Systems, Bonsucro sought to test and disseminate a new approach to sustainability monitoring and reporting in the sugar sector which fully integrated land tenure issues while producing reliable, consistent and near-real-time data at a low and affordable cost. It did do so by linking the Landscope risk and diligence tools under development by TMP Systems into the implementation of the Bonsucro Production Standard (BPS), and making the tools, assessments conducted and data products available thorugh the Bonsucro connect web site. The Project worked to do this in two ways: i) In a first stage, it engaged a wide range of companies investing in sugar production in and supply chain development in addition to sugar traders, industry brands end users and Service providers to assess their willingness to deploy this approach and their interest in the tools being developed for certification of their operations. It then assessed 110 sugar farms and mills in Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia for exposure to tenure Risk, data coverage and developed a set of risk profiles to assess suitability for implementation with the aim of reducing risks and demonstrating compliance with Bonsucro standards. For access to TMP Systems’ developed Landscope tools and information on how to apply them, including in the sugar sector, see: www.landscope.info ii) The second stage, which aimed to establish an affordable and particatory monitoring and verification system intended to demonstrate compliance with Bonsucro standards, integrating land tenure risks and land related governance issues, while also usable for monitoring and management of the full range of business sustainability issues. Although the approach was endorsed by various leading sugar companies and supply chain actors, in practice the field work to pilot the field monitoring system focused on sugar growers’ organisations and cooperatives supplying Illovo Sugar, at six sites in Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia. The principal output of the project is set of several bespoke data collection, management and reporting modules that can be applied by farmers and growers’ organisations modules, using hand held tablets linked in to a central database. Supported by pilot case studies and endorsements by stakeholders, these farmer modules allow the project partners to present the market with evidence that the new approach can improve farm management practices and assist smallholder suppliers in securing their tenure rights and accessing credit. To access these modules and more information about how to apply them go to http://www.farmermanagementmodules.com/
Landscope
Landscope is a system for measuring tenure risk, a term created to describe the financial risk associated with local opposition to a real asset. This kind of opposition to investments is very common across Africa, Asia and Latin America, often causing significant financial losses and operational headaches. It applies a new approach to analysing geospatial data about social, environmental and political issues that is designed to help companies and investors in emerging and frontier markets to prepare a proper assessment of tenure risk at project, supply chain or portfolio level.
Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders
In partnership with the FIDH, OMCT created the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders in 1997. This unique collaboration is based on the complementarity of each organisation’s approach and is based on their respective NGO networks. In parallel, many meetings on this subject have been held, culminating with Forum 1998, which brought together more than 600 NGOs from 60 countries, just before the adoption of the United Nations’ Declaration on Human Rights Defenders in 1998.
World Organisation Against Torture
The World Organisation Against Torture is the world’s largest coalition of non-governmental organisations fighting against arbitrary detention, torture, summary and extrajudicial executions, forced disappearances and other forms of violence.
Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace
The Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace was a dicastery of the Roman Curia dedicated to "action-oriented studies" for the international promotion of justice, peace, and human rights from the perspective of the Roman Catholic Church.
Libreria Editrice Vaticana
The Vatican Publishing House (Italian: Libreria Editrice Vaticana; Latin: Officina libraria editoria Vaticana; LEV) is a publisher established by the Holy See in 1926. It is responsible for publishing official documents of the Roman Catholic Church, including Papal bulls and encyclicals. On 27 June 2015, Pope Francis decreed that the Vatican Publishing House would eventually be incorporated into a newly established Secretariat for Communications in the Roman Curia.
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations that is concerned with international public health. It was established on 7 April 1948, and is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. The WHO is a member of the United Nations Development Group.
Lancaster University
Lancaster University (legally the University of Lancaster) is a collegiate public research university in Lancaster, Lancashire, England. The university was established by Royal Charter in 1964, one of several new universities created in the 1960s.
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) (German: Karlsruher Institut für Technologie) is a public research university and one of the largest research and educational institutions in Germany.