The report marks the end of the monitoring under the U.S. Presidency of the G8 of AFSI donors financial and non-financial commitments. It confirms that at the conclusion of the three-year pledge period, AFSI donors were able to collectively met their commitment to mobilize $22.24 billion in global food security investments over three years. There is still a need to identify further which part of these investments went specifically to agricultural research and development and we hope that the work towards the formulation of specific indicators for AR4D initiated by OECD-DAC and other agencies will be continued under the current UK G8 Presidency. And that donors will continue to support the generation of internationally comparable data on agricultural R&D investments and capacity for developing countries.
GFAR which organized a Stakeholder Workshop on Tracking Investments in Agricultural Research for Development (Berlin, January 2012), to discuss chronic under-investment in Agricultural Research for Development systems in the different regions has continued its collaboration with the group of donors monitoring AFSI investments. Participants to the Berlin workshop, which included AARINENA, APAAARI, CACAARI, FARA and FORAGRO, aid agencies like the Global Donor Platform on Rural Development (GDPRD), the European Initiative on Agricultural research for Development (EIARD), and the OECD, had recognized the value of establishing national baseline data on AR4D investments and capacities that ASTI/IFPRI has started to establish with the support of GFAR. They had called for pursuing this effort. These recommendations were reported to the Managing Development for Results Group of the L’Aquila Food Security Initiative (AFSI-MdfR) which met in February 2012 in Washington DC, to monitor and report on the investments made under the L’Aquila Initiative.
In this context, GFAR organized a session at GCARD2 on Public investments, chaired by USAID and the US Department of State leading the AFSI-MdFR Group for 2012, and facilitated by ASTI. The 2012 Global assessment of AR&D spending was launched at this occasion. The session discussed the achievements and further developments expected of AFSI normally under the responsibility of the UK G8 Presidency for 2013. GFAR Secretariat also participated in the meeting which discussed the drafting of the final report of the AFSI-MdFR Initiative in Maputo (December 4-7, 2012).
Phot credit: ©FAO/Saul Palma