Program Farmer Common Sense in Business Executive summary of grant application. Agriterra is a network organisation of Dutch agri-employers’ organisations and companies. It has a vision that farmers’ associations and cooperatives can have a positive influence by accelerating the development process, ensuring a more equal distribution of income and enhancing democratic decision-making and relations. Additional benefits are the empowerment of women and young people, and the potential to improve rural resilience to climate change. This vision has become almost undisputed, the mechanisms are understood in our theory of change, and the mission derived from it - the strengthening of farmers’ organisations - is the only logical one. Our approaches (advocacy, farmer entrepreneurship and bankable co-ops) have brought excellent results over two decades. Our strategy has been to obtain funds for farmers’ organisations through inclusion in official development cooperation, and we have fulfilled our mission. We now recognise that capital flows have changed: development cooperation is less significant than new flows of capital into developing countries and agriculture. But it is still important to make project funds available – via grants to – farmers’ organisations to support them as they develop truly sustainable incomegenerating models. The appearance of local and multi-national companies with sourcing and selling aspirations at the ‘base of the pyramid’ brings the farmers ’organisations a huge opportunity. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is becoming more important, and we can help companies connect, via farmers’ organisations, to the pyramid. Banks and investment funds are seeking to increase their portfolios in agriculture and agribusiness, and are searching for bankable clients and projects in developing countries, while companies are interested in produce of small farmers. Agriterra has the systems, procedures, approaches, people and capital necessary to take advantage of these opportunities. Thus, connecting with these flows should allow the development of new income-generating models for both Agriterra and our clients (farmers’ organisations and cooperatives). An issue to work on in this programme period. The policy environment is favourable, because agriculture, food security and farmers’ organisations are back on the agenda. Modern policy calls for private enterprise, civil society and governments to work together. Agriterra is itself an expression of collaboration between organised farmers, rural women and cooperative businesses in the Netherlands. It has always enjoyed good relations with the Dutch government. Under the current funding proposal, Agriterra plans to intensify its role in connection with governments and companies, especially from the Netherlands. Agriterra mobilises hands-on experience from the Dutch agricultural sector via the socalled Agripool. Experience-based knowledge is increasingly important to fulfil the demands of private enterprise wishing to connect with smallholders, so we are developing a new business strategy to reflect the changing business environment. The strategy takes advantage of the way business is changing, builds on the strengths of Agriterra’s past performance and addresses the weaknesses that emerged from an internal analysis. Agriterra’s focus is no longer on capturing funds to grant to farmers’ organisations. Instead, it offers them the expertise and knowledge needed to tap into funds available from different sources. Agriterra also supports them to produce financial strategies that underpin actions to further their members’ interests. The proposed international sourcing of agripoolers will broaden the supply of personnel, allowing stricter screening and high quality responses. And the professionalization of the Agripool will lead to efficient deployment of experts that match client requests. vii Local and foreign companies alike are seeking products from the bottom of the pyramid. With our three approaches (the Agriterra fundamentals: farmer-based advocacy, farmer entrepreneurship; and farmer-led agribusiness development), and with staff advisors and agripoolers, Agriterra works ‘from both ends’ towards an association of these companies with the social base of the associations and cooperatives. This strengthens our clients in their operations, as well as in their position in value chains, the economy and society at large. Agriterra does this - in the words of Dale Carnegie, the farmer’s son who became the developer of courses that bear his name - “with flaming enthusiasm, backed up by horse sense and persistence”. Our consistent vision is that strong farmers’ organisations and cooperatives will change the character and speed of development, leading more swiftly to democratic relations and a smaller gap between the rich and the poor. The plan has a budget of 71,000,000 euros, of which 55,000,000 euros are requested from DGIS as subsidy for the next five years. Follows Agricultural cooperatives