Donor-private sector partnerships (DPPs)

8 July 2019. An Oxfam International Briefing Paper, Faith is not enough: ensuring that aid donor-private sector partnerships contribute to sustainable development assesses donor-private sector partnerships (DPPs) of key donors (USA, France and the EU, pages 26-33) based on a framework with 6 components:

1. Demonstration of sustainable development objectives;
2. Demonstration of additionality;
3. Adherence to aid and development effectiveness principles;
4. Respecting mandatory and voluntary standards for private sector operations;
5. Demonstration of due diligence and risk management;
6. Provision of sound monitoring and evaluation processes.

Although the main focus is not on agricultural partnerships, four agricultural partnerships were assessed (Netherlands' project for roses in Ethiopia, the IDH Cocoa Programme, Tim Horton's Coffee Partnership in Brazil, Guatemala, Honduras and Colombia, and Turning avacado waste into green energy, pages 41-43). The briefing also includes a short review of the agricultural partnerships in a textbox (p. 33):

An Oxfam assessment of DPPs in agriculture found all of the partnerships focus primarily on commercializing value chains to promote food security or support private sector development and growth. The review questioned the extent to which these DPPs define their development objectives in terms of final impacts on poverty reduction, food security, inequality, gender equality and environmental sustainability. All programmes and partnerships looked at the number of jobs created, number of farmers taking credit and so forth (quantitative data), without however looking sufficiently at impacts on poverty, gender or inequality (qualitative data). The most commercially viable small-holders were more likely to attract investment than those operating on the margins, who are unlikely to attract private investors, even with ODA or other public de-risking. These marginalized small-holders, more often women than men, are likely to be left further behind, potentially increasing income and gender inequality.

The paper was written by former Oxfam International Policy Advisor Hilary Jeune, and draws on research carried out for Oxfam in 2016 and 2017 by Shannon Kindornay and Claire Godfrey.