The Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) Group has agreed on a $10.54 billion package for the Comprehensive Food Security Response Program (FSRP) that will support member countries in addressing the ongoing food crisis and increase the group’s ongoing efforts to contribute to strengthening its members’ resilience to future food security problems.
The package was announced after at an extraordinary joint meeting, chaired by IsDB President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the IsDB Group Dr. Muhammad Al Jasser.
In a statement, IsDB said that to jump-start the program, the financing package is expected to provide immediate financing of up to $3.2 billion (over the coming 18-month period) for short-term interventions by providing (i) emergency food and agricultural supply and (ii) social protection and livelihood support to the most vulnerable populations.
The primary focus of the program and the bulk of the financing envelope of the remaining $7.3 billion, which will span over the next three years, will be on developing innovative medium- and long-term interventions to address structural weaknesses and root causes of food insecurity in the member states. These include low productivity, rural poverty, climate change, and weak resilience of regional and national agricultural and food systems through six (6) key initiatives:
(i)Â building agricultural resilience to climate change (ii) food and input value-chains (iii) smallholders’ productivity and market access (iv) rural livelihood support (v) livestock and fisheries development and (vi) building resilient food supply systems.
The total IsDB Group’s financing support for agriculture and food security currently stands at $20.6 billion, comprising 1,538 operations.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has disrupted food supplies, as both countries are the largest producers of wheat and several Arab countries, Egypt especially, import bulk of their wheat from these countries.