HIGH-LEVEL FOOD SYSTEMS EVENT: Leveraging Change: The Role of Donors in Food Systems Transformation

Donors play a key role in supporting initiatives that form the foundation for collaborative efforts across food systems through their innovations, programming and investments. This independent Food Systems event of the Global Donor Platform for Rural Development (GDPRD) is a contribution to ensure donors and their partners collaborate to realize the full leveraging potential of donor funding.

Optimizing the catalytic and leveraging potential of donor support will be key in responding to the outcomes of the Food Systems Summit (FSS). Donor investments in food systems are relatively small compared to the investments of farmers, food sector businesses and national governments, but they are crucial for enabling and incentivizing other actors to play their part.

The event will:

• Highlight key elements of donor perspectives on the food systems agenda in response to the UN FSS.
• Discuss and seek agreement on the key priorities for future donor focus.
• Discuss some of the most effective modalities for donor coordination going forward.

The event will also launch the GDPRD stocktaking report on “Donor contributions to food systems”, a mapping of the patterns and scale of food systems-related funding and an assessment of the extent donors are embracing a food system framing and aligning their investments to the UN FSS Action Tracks.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Jemimah Njuki
Director for Africa
International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

PANELISTS

Gerda Verburg
United Nations Assistant Secretary-General and Coordinator
Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement

Giorgio Marrapodi
Director-General for Development Cooperation
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of Italy

Jim Barnhart
Assistant to the Administrator
USAID Bureau for Resilience and Food Security

Alvaro Lario
Officer in Charge, Associate Vice-President for External Relations and Governance, and Associate Vice-President and Chief Financial Officer
International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)

Carla Montesi
Director, Green Deal, Digital Agenda, Directorate-General for International Partnerships (DG INTPA)
European Commission

Martin Bwalya
Ag Director, Knowledge Management and Programme Evaluation (KMPE)
Africa Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD)

Andrew Campbell
Chief Executive Officer
Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR)

Jim Woodhill
Director
AgriFoodNexus Consulting, and Honorary Research Associate
Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford

Tristan Armstrong
Senior Sector Specialist, Agricultural Development and Food Security
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) – Australia. Co-chair of the GDPRD
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Conrad Rein
Policy Officer, Directorate-General for International Partnerships (DG INTPA)
European Commission.Co-chair of the GDPRD
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MODERATOR

Henry Bonsu
International broadcaster and media consultant