1 – Context :

Created in 2006 on the occasion of the Paris Conference on innovative financing to fund development, the Leading Group for innovative financing to fund development today gathers 63 member states, 18 international organizations, a foundation and around thirty Non-governmental organizations. His objective is to conceive study and promote new mechanisms intended to complete the traditional development aid by bringing new, stable and predictable resources. Five thematic working groups were set up under the umbrella of the Leading group.

The ninth plenary session of the Leading Group was held in Bamako, on June 24th and 25th. It created the Task-force on innovative financing for food security and agriculture. In the terms of reference adopted during that meeting, the Leading Group assigned to the Task-force the objective " to study the possibilities of formulating propositions of innovative financing intended to increase the financing dedicated to food security, nutrition and sustainable agricultural development, that is to reduce the number of hungry persons and malnutrition, as set up within the Millennium Development Goals (MDG).”

2 - The first meeting of Task-force "food security and agriculture" of the Leading Group on innovative financing to fund development was held in Rome on October 21st. It attracted a strong participation (about fifty participants). The interventions, in particular those of International Organizations (FAO, IFAD and World Bank, which presented the state of progress of their works and, in some cases, the already undertaken actions), witnessed the interest this theme is bearing.

Under chairmanship of the Ambassador of Mali, whose country has been entrusted the presidency of this Task-force, Spain led the debates, in its capacity as President of the Leading Group, with the support of the permanent secretariat assumed by France.

3 - The main objectives of this meeting were :

  To inform countries, international organizations and civil society, be they member or not of the Leading Group, on the objectives of this Task-Force ;

  To establish the Task-Force as such, every country, international Organization and representatives of the civil society, wishing to participate in it being welcome (this participation is not subject to the payment of any financial contribution but fruit of a will to contribute to the works on the theme) ;

  To launch the preparation of a report on innovative financing for food security and agriculture to be presented to the Leading Group, by mid-2012, according to the orientations fixed in the terms of reference adopted during the Bamako meeting. The aim is to establish a group of 8 to 10 international experts whose task will be to draft a report. Contribution to the financing for the publication of the report and propositions of names of international experts for the drafting are expected from the members of the Task-Force. The projected budget for the group of experts is estimated in the neighbourhood of 20 000 €.

To this end, the Presidency set up a precise follow-up agenda :

• the experts will be selected on the basis of suggestions received from the members or the non-members of the Leading Group, by the end of november ; the secretariat will circulate, under procedure of silence, on behalf of the Presidency, the list of proposed experts based on the criterias of fair geographical distribution and complementarities of technical skills ;

• the experts will submit a progress report of their work during the next meeting of the Leading Group, end 2011 / beginning 2012 ;

• the experts will submit their final report, including operational and concrete recommendations, before mid-2012.

Both presidencies of the Leading Group and the Task-Force as well as the permanent secretariat would be grateful to, every participating country, or organization to inform the secretariat, before november 30th, of their proposals of experts’ names, based on the criterias set up in the ToR of the Task-Force (attached t this e-mail), and/or financial contribution to the work of Task-Force.