SOCODEVI is bolstering its presence in Côte d’Ivoire with a new project: the women and cocoa communities initiative (IFCC).
Funded by Global Affairs Canada (GAC), IFCC is a five-year project (2022-2027) aiming to improve the living conditions of rural cocoa communities in Côte d’Ivoire, including 5,000 women and adolescent girls.
This is a new comprehensive project for SOCODEVI in consortium with the Paul Gérin-Lajoie Foundation, a Canadian NGO specializing in education.
With the support of Canada and cocoa and chocolate enterprises, SOCODEVI is adopting a multisectoral and integrated approach together with IFCC, drawing on the consortium’s combined expertise in socio-economic development via the cooperative formula and education. The program will focus on the intergenerational transmission of poverty.
A total of 30 cocoa cooperative enterprises will be supported by the project, as will be the Fédération Nationales des Femmes Producrices de Café-Cacao de Côte d’Ivoire (FNFPCC-CI).
Partnerships with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MINADER) and the National Agency for Support to Rural Development (ANADER) will foster cocoa farming communities’ resilience to climate change and socio-economic shocks.
“SOCODEVI has been working in Côte d’Ivoire for more than 35 years within various sectors, especially cocoa, where our support to cooperatives is recognized. Now, the IFCC project will really enable us to empower women and girls in cocoa communities.We know that they are very involved in cocoa farming and other related income-generating activities (IGAs) and we will build on this to improve their socio-economic empowerment. Of course, we will be focusing on capacity-building for cooperatives, while working toward gender equality and adaptation to climate change. Our collaboration with the public and private sectors will be essential to the sustainability of our initiatives, especially with private cocoa and chocolate enterprises and their corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs.”
– Alexandre Robitaille-Lachance, Country Director, SOCODEVI Côte d’Ivoire.
IFCC comes under Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP) and aligns with the country development priorities in Côte d’Ivoire, and more specifically women and girls’ full participation in the economic growth of their communities and respect for their rights, in particular their right to education.