Conference Overview

The conference will focus on processes relating to the delivery of agricultural and rural development aid while keeping government’s progress in perspective. It will also look at donors’ perspectives on key drivers and strategic approaches to rural development delivery. International development partners agree that national and global hunger reduction targets will not be met and with only 4 years to the 2015 MDG target date, 1.4 billion individuals still live on less than $1.25 a day. Platform members are keen to interrogate the myriad factors that hinder rural development, including people-centred development, local government, economic conditions, natural resources, rural infrastructure, rural service systems and economic governance, both local and global.

The conference seeks to facilitate an exchange of ideas and the development of initiatives to effectively improve agricultural and rural development assistance, as well as create new networks and strengthen existing ones. Although agriculture is central to the platform’s vision, the social dimensions of rural development, food security, gender issues and medicine and nutrition, are all explicit priorities that need examination.

Reasons to Attend

  • To Rural Funders/Donors:


    • Review and take stock of research on key rural finance innovations in order to enumerate what has worked and why?
    • Highlight opportunities and challenges for scaling up programme evaluation and monitoring insights;
    • Identify what projects to fund and current needs and aspirations of the community;
    • Monitor accountability and transparency in the use of the donated funds;
    • Highlight the critical sectors they are willing to donate funds to, funding criteria, eligibility and funding schedule;
    • Check the positive impacts of funds in improving the livelihoods and sustainability of communities;
    • Exchange expertise and establish best practice on evaluation of the rural development policy on funding;
    • Examine how Social Innovation Funds/Corporate Social Investment Funds can allow you to choose an area of interest, and we invite your deeper engagement as advisors, investors and other stakeholders;

  • To Government, Development Agencies & Academics:


    • Set up and run networks that facilitate exchange of expertise, support implementation and evaluation of rural development policy;
    • Define strategies to strengthen ties between research, policy and decision-making processes in the field of rural development;
    • Support the national networks and transnational cooperation initiatives;
    • Check the policy gaps in regards to social and community development;
    • Check how they can harness, devise and integrate players in the comprehensive rural development programme;
    • Assess and evaluate the effectiveness, feasibility and practicality of their implemented IDP & CRDP;
    • See how they can transform a policy from being a mere document to action while making funding a driving force;
    • See development as a freedom and a human right even to the rural communities, hence device ways of including the then marginalised and segregated rural communities;
    • Monitor current activity of the Rural Development Department as the rural champion within government and its delivery plan on funding;
    • Eradicate poverty through wealth creation as a means of emancipating the rural community;
    • Ensure coordination between the local, national, regional and International rural networks and organisations active in rural development;
    • Analyse rural enterprises business viability and competitiveness;

  • Stakeholders and beneficiaries: Rural People:


    • Interact with Local Action Groups and devise ways of working together and expand their social capital;
    • Expose relevant administrations and institutions that are involved in community development;
    • Meet other bodies and actors concerned with rural development targeting rural territorial specifities and needs;
    • Realise the link between agriculture, education, social cohesion and the wider rural economy;
    • Learn how farming, livestock production, tourism, parks, poultry production and forestry remain crucial for land use and the management of natural resources in rural areas as a platform for economic diversification in rural communities;
    • Understand the delivery mechanisms of Rural Development Funding Policy;
    • Get key information about past and future assessment rounds, including statistics, case studies, and key dates;
    • Improve the quality of life in rural areas and encouraging diversification of the rural economy;

 


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