International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture
Grants to strengthen capacity in the developing countries for actions to conserve and manage plant genetic resources in agriculture
Principal Office: International
The objectives of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA) are to conserve and sustain plant genetic resources for food and agriculture, and to promote fair and equitable sharing of the benefits derived from their use.
The countries which participate in the Treaty exchange and share genetic material and information for most of the world’s most important food crops. The Treaty aims to reduce the time and expense to negotiate individual bilateral agreements, and to promote capacity building and technology transfer in international crop research.
The Treaty also expresses a commitment to protect the rights of farmers and indigenous communities that have traditional knowledge of plant resources.
Grant Programs for Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Natural Resources
Benefit-Sharing Fund. The Treaty established a Benefit-Sharing Fund, which makes grants to support the implementation of the Treaty in developing countries. Grants are for information exchange, technology transfer, and capacity building in topics of plant genetic diversity – with a particular interest in the risks to agriculture posed by climate change. The scope of the Fund also includes on-farm conservation and management of plant genetic resources, and sustainable use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.
Eligibility for grants extends to government and non-government organizations in the developing countries that are contracting parties to the ITPGRFA. These organizations include gene banks, universities, research institutes, development NGOs, farmers’ organizations, regional and international organizations, and others.
APPLICATION: The ITPGRFA announces calls for proposals every two years (in principle).
Each call for proposals defines a thematic focus within the broad scope covered by the Treaty. The application process has two stages. Pre-proposals are followed by invitations for full proposals from a subset of the pre-proposals.
Geographical Distribution of Grant Activities in Developing Countries
The contracting parties to the ITPGRFA include the following developing countries, applying the regional geographical framework of the Terra Viva Grants Directory.
Southeast Asia and Pacific Islands: Cambodia, Fiji, Indonesia, Kiribati, Laos, Malaysia, Marshall Islands, Myanmar, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Samoa, Tonga
East Asia: North Korea
South Asia: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka
Eurasia and Central Asia: Afghanistan, Armenia, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Turkey
Eastern Europe and Russia: Albania, Montenegro, Serbia
Middle East and North Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen
Sub-Saharan Africa: Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Dem Rep Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Namibia, Niger, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
Latin America and Caribbean: Brazil, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, St. Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela
The Treaty’s website is available in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish.
Potentially interested grant applicants may want to contact the Treaty’s national focal points for information and guidance.
The Secretariat of the ITPGRFA is hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. FAO provides contact information for the ITPGRFA Secretariat.