Lessons from Innovation: Skills Standards and Certification

Working with public, private, and nonprofit sector partners, MIF has invested in the development of skills standards and certification systems with fifteen projects in Latin America and the Caribbean. The goal: to increase the competitiveness and productivity of workers and industries throughout the region.Public Sector, Private Sector, Economic Development & Growth, Financial Sector, public; private; nonprofit; sector partners; MIF development of skills standards; certification systems; Latin America; the Caribbean; competitiveness; productivity; workers; industries

Poverty and Inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean

This document surveys Bank lending operations designed to fight poverty and enhance social equity, with emphasis on recently approved projects with innovative components. It also surveys a broad range of poverty-related non-lending activities carried out by the Bank over the past two years. It includes a general framework for poverty reduction in Latin America and the Caribbean, specifying a number of areas of emphasis: enhancing opportunities for the poor; assets and markets; contributing to human development; improving the quality of life of the poor; social protection; and good governance and social inclusion.Poverty, Social Policy & Protection, Education, Health, Environmental Policy, poverty; inequality

Summit of the Americas: The IDB Agenda to Support the Mandates of the Summits of Quebec and Nuevo León: Activities and Strategic Programs

During the Hemispheric Summit that took place in Quebec, Canada, in April 2001, the Inter-American Development Bank presented a set of 22 strategic programs intended to contribute to meeting the mandates that stem from the Summits of the Americas and the commitments that are part of the Plan of Action adopted in Quebec. Since then, the IDB has carried out intensive and complex financial and technical activities in the context of those 22 strategic programs. The programs fall into five areas that summarize the mandates adopted by the Heads of State and Government of the Americas, namely: democratic governance and political development; integration and economic development; ecology and sustainable development; equity and human development; and connectivity and technological development. During the Special Summit in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico (January 2004), the IDB presented a report summarizing achievements made since 2001 with respect to the programs presented in Quebec. In addition, the Declaration of Nuevo León establishes new mandates.Research & Development, Economic Development & Growth, Democracy, Governance, Mar del Plata Summit, November 2005, SOC2005-15

Billions in Motion: Latino Immigrants, Remittances and Banking

Research on how remitters choose the means to send money home, including projections of remittance flows to Mexico and Central America that illustrate the extraordinary growth in recent years and the potential for continued growth and a demographic portrait of Latino remittance senders drawn from the Pew Hispanic Center/Kaiser Family Foundation National Survey of Latinos. Study is partially based on a Bendixen survey of Latino immigrants in USA.Remittances, Latino Immigrants, Remittances, Banking, USA Inmigrantes latinos, remesas, banca, EUA

Technical Seminar on Water and Poverty for Latin America and the Caribbean: Setting a Research Agenda

This document is the Final Report prepared by the National Center for the Environment (CENMA) of the University of Chile for the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to comply with number 5. of the Letter of Agreement signed by both institutions to specified the conditions under which the Seminar was carried out and organized jointly by them. The Seminar was held in Santiago, Chile on May 22-23, 2003. This document contains summaries of the working sessions and a discussion of some of the theoretical and empirical issues related to one of the different aspects of the two dimensions of the water-poverty relationship under analysis in the Seminar.Water management, Water Supply and Sanitation, Poverty, Environment, Water Resources

Developing Policies and Proposals for Alleviating Key Binding Constraints To Agriculture in The Caribbean: workshop Proceedings Final Report

Context: Agriculture has been a critical building block of all Caribbean economies, in terms of its contribution to gross national output, foreign exchange earnings and employment. However, in recent years, in several countries of the Caribbean, its economic performance has been characterized by a marked unevenness and a failure to attain a steady growth pattern. Export agriculture has been in crisis; precipitated by the deterioration in traditional industries due to adjustment difficulties related to trade liberalization and commodity market price volatility; and instability in others, such as, citrus, coffee, cocoa and spices, due to severe competitive pressures and a proliferation of stringent product and process standards in developed countries. The food production sector, which generally performed better, has been faced with increasing competition in the domestic markets as the process of globalization and trade liberalization progresses. These recent experiences in agriculture suggest that policy formulation and consequent programme implementation have been key constraints in the transformation of agriculture in the region. Regional policy makers have repeatedly emphasized that domestic agriculture is largely responsive to external stimuli. In response to this, and the changing economic environment, Caribbean countries are engaged in the process of adjusting and reorienting their agricultural and rural development policies to better equip the sector to meet this new paradigm for the 21st Century. Consequently, policy change, strong and practical policies must be prerequisites for the agricultural adjustment and repositioning process. President of Guyana, Bharrat Jagdeo, lead Head for Agriculture within the CARICOM Conference of Heads of Government (CHoG) recognized that the response for agriculture by our States, singly and collectively, requires major adjustments. Such adjustment should lead to marked improvements in how we engage, support and finance the business of agriculture, including how we organize our supply base, market our products and procure our inputs. These have significant policy implications for our Ministers of Agriculture and our entire Cabinets at the national levels, as well as for the CHoG and the Forum of Ministers of Agriculture at the regional level. This initiative, facilitated by the Alliance for the Sustainable Development of Agriculture and the Rural Milieu in the Caribbean (The Alliance ) and the CTA/IICA-supported Caribbean Region Agricultural Policy Network (CaRAPN) is therefore fully complementary to the CARICOM Regional Transformation Program (RTP) for Agriculture. It seeks to facilitate agriculture’s decisive move from the crossroads that it currently finds itself into bold action to reposition its industries, enterprises and peoples along a path of sustainable and equitable growth. As part of that repositioning process, the CHoG mandated countries, supported by development organizations working in agriculture within the region, to identify and develop a package of initiatives to address the three or four most binding constraints to a dynamic and competitive agricultural sector in all member states of the region. The identification of these constraints has emerged from a region-wide process of ongoing national consultations. The framework for the conduct of these national consultations was developed by the Facilitators Briefing Meeting held in Trinidad and Tobago from September 30 to October 01. This regional policy workshop is thus convened to take these national outputs a step further in the process of developing the framework, of the supportive actions required at the regional level, for agricultural repositioning. Objectives: This workshop seeks to: ? develop firm proposals that seek, in a practical and meaningful manner, to alleviate the three or four most binding constraints to national agricultural sector growth initiatives for the consideration of the CARICOM Heads of Government. ? strengthen the framework for regional-level agricultural policy analysis, formulation and implementation within the context of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) in order to add value to national actions and engender regional harmony among development projects and programs; Expected Outputs: As a result of the workshop: ? Member states will be provided with a draft framework to guide regional agricultural policy analysis, formulation and implementation within the context of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME); ? Fulfillment of the Jagdeo mandate which required development of draft proposals that seek to address the three or four most binding constraints through regional action, for consideration of the CARICOM Heads of Government.This initiative seeks to facilitate agriculture’s decisive move from the crossroads that it currently finds itself into bold action to reposition its industries, enterprises and peoples along a path of sustainable and equitable growth

Getting Agriculture Moving

IN THIS ISSUE The promise of a ‘new’ agriculture has been on the region’s horizon for some time now. These promises offer new hope for redundant traditional industries, such as, raw cane sugar, or mass-produced conventional bananas. They offer unprecidented opportunities for new and often revolutionary uses of old or ordinary agricultural crops. They offer new possibilities for expanding the production frontiers in agriculture. The old agriculture has been overtaken by new and competitive ‘designer’ processes, packaging and products This AgriView issue summarises the regional desires and debate surrounding the ushering into being of a new agriculture in the lead article on: Getting Agriculture Moving This sets the stage for discussion on the essential aspects as they relate to alleviating some of the Key Binding Constraints that are now in full focus of the agricultural repositioning debate. Some of these issues and the current actions of countries, individually, and as a region, emphasise the need to urgently and comprehensively: Secure the Soils and Water page 3 Assure Health and Safety page 4 Build Resilience to Natural Hazards page 5 The importance of resilence to natural hazards is even more urgent and critical given the experiences of the 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons. The need to ensure full participation is underscored with an extract from the SEEDS publication on: Disaster Relief, Recovery and Women page 6 Further the need to reposition agriculture in the shortest possible timefram will require that region, collectively: Make the Quantum Technology Leap page 7 Explore the Potential of Agri-energy page 8 Bridge the Digital Divide page 9 and in that context Building a Hybrid Agri-Information System page 10 to measure progress towards achieving stated goals. AgriView continues by providing a youth’s outlook for agriculture that links fond memories of old agricutlure into a ‘designer-driven’ new vision in: I see a Renaissance for Agriculture page 11 . . . and ends with a pictoral representation of sights of the ‘new’ agriculture: Signs of the New Agriculture page 12This sets the stage for discussion on the essential aspects as they relate to alleviating some of the Key Binding Constraints that are now in full focus of the agricultural repositioning debate

Small producer....big business!

This AV focuses on a topic that has been of continuing interest in the agriculture community and general public, that of food security, from the farm to the policy level. The opening article provides a synopsis of the recently initiated regional response to ensure that “all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.” This initiative, spearheaded by the CARICOM Secretariat with funding from the Government of Italy and implementation support from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is complemented by a number of other initiatives as indicated in the article on Advancing Agriculture in CARICOM. The word ‘advancing’ is used repeatedly throughout the newsletter because it is a key action word in the theme selected for the 9th Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA) 2010. This AV also highlights the CWA from its inception in 1999 and promotes the 9th CWA to be held in Grenada in late October. So mark your calendar. The issue of Food Security is also an integral part of the 9th CWA’s theme and on that score, Ian Ivey feels certain that Food prices will soar as he speaks to an AV contributor on the subject of food prices and the capacity and competitiveness of local food production. AV follows this perspective with two contributions on the role and importance of small producers – farmers and fisherfolk to food security, with a view to promoting the acceptance of small producers as the ‘backbone of food security’. This view is, however debatable, given the policy of the former Government of Trinidad and Tobago to promote ‘mega farms’ as a major solution to rising food prices and dependence on imported foods. AV contributor Waheeda Abass provides some insights to the small vs mega farm issue from a Trinidad perspective. While not enough time has elapsed to make a judgement on the relative role and impact of mega farms in Trinidad, there is a widely held view that the expectations have been over stated. AV also took this opportunity to update- for those involved in the network, remind- for those who already knew of its existence and introduce- for those who did not know it existed, the CaRAPN, i.e., Caribbean Regional Agricultural Policy Network, which according to one stakeholder at a 27-30 July Medium Term Strategy meeting, “should contribute to agricultural development in a holistic way, looking at the traditional production and marketing issues, but also adding aspects of the environment, the social dimensions and the global dimensions.” We invite you to read, ponder and contact us for clarification, more information and any contributions you may wish to make on the topics covered or any other topic of interest to agricultural and rural development in the region.Small producers, i.e., both farmers and food processors, are a big business in agriculture in the Caribbean. Their numbers far outweigh their relatively larger counterparts. Despite the difficult conditions under which they operate, including marginal lands, limited access to credit and the virtual non-existence of risk mitigation mechanisms, the contributions of these micro and small entrepreneurs to economic development, social stability and food security are big by comparison to their size..

Farming Systems Research

Report on the February 1986 Inter Center Workshop on Farming Systems Research (FSR) held at ICRISAT Center, Hyderabad, India. The Workshop, which was suggested by TAC, which noted that 14% of the system's resources was devoted to farming systems in some form. The meeting was intended to help centers develop a unified understanding of how FSR should be approached, to assess the relevance, impact, and priority of such research in the CGIAR, and to outline its future directions. It drew on the stripe review of 1978 on this subject. A statement by representatives of the nine IARCs attending is attached.Agenda document, TAC 39th Meeting, March 1986