Feed the Future Partnering for Innovation Activity Year One Work Plan

The activity aims to promote market growth by leveraging resources and expertise to develop win-win partnerships that will lead to sustainable development in developing markets, reducing poverty, hunger, and malnutrition. The initiative will focus on addressing constraints to increasing access to inputs such as seed, feed, fertilizers, machinery, and irrigation systems, and other off-the-shelf technologies. The activity will be implemented through two main components: Commercialization of FTF Technologies and Partnership Development. Component 1, Commercialization of FTF Technologies, aims to identify and test promising agricultural technologies that benefit smallholder farmers. The work plan for this component includes creating an application and selection process, appointing an internal review committee, identifying and selecting an external commercialization review committee, surveying current technology providers, and soliciting seed funding applications from organizations. The commercialization review committee will evaluate and rank technology concept notes based on developed criteria and scoring rubric. The committee will also provide input concerning the technology in question and ongoing business development advice to the finalists during their implementation phase. The team anticipates awarding one trial seed grant award in quarter one, which will not exceed $100,000, to test the selection and award process and identify any improvements needed. Component 2, Partnership Development, aims to promote the development and dissemination of technology by supporting the development of profitable and scaled technology marketing and distribution, complementary technologies, and technical assistance delivered as a package to maximize the component value. The activity will support developing partnerships with private sector companies and other stakeholders by providing grants. The team will take an inventory of existing partnership relationships, research existing USAID and other development partnership programs, and develop and populate a long-list partner inventory database. The activity will also develop guidelines based on past successful models, cross-reference partnerships with concurrent technology inventory under Component 1, and preliminary identification of up to six priority partnerships for model analysis with Component 3. The Feed the Future Partnering for Innovation Activity aims to promote market growth, reduce poverty, hunger, and malnutrition, and improve the lives of smallholder farmers in developing markets. The activity will be implemented over a 12-month period from October 1, 2012, to September 30, 2013. The team will continually analyze and improve the process, building on lessons learned and new information gleaned during all selection and award phases. The activity will also compile a longer list of potential technologies on an ongoing basis for future rounds of funding. The team anticipates beginning the second round of technology grants in the fourth quarter of year 1, so that awards can be made and implementation begun early in the second year. The Feed the Future Partnering for Innovation Activity will focus resources on bringing to market and scaling up promising agricultural technologies that benefit smallholder farmers, and in particular, ensuring increased opportunities for women is an overarching objective of each sub-activity. The activity will also support developing partnerships with private sector companies and other stakeholders to promote the development and dissemination of technology. The activity will take an inventory of existing partnership relationships, research existing USAID and other development partnership programs, and develop and populate a long-list partner inventory database. The team will also develop guidelines based on past successful models, cross-reference partnerships with concurrent technology inventory under Component 1, and preliminary identification of up to six priority partnerships for model analysis with Component 3. The Feed the Future Partnering for Innovation Activity aims to promote market growth, reduce poverty, hunger, and malnutrition, and improve the lives of smallholder farmers in developing markets. The activity will be implemented over a 12-month period from October 1, 2012, to September 30, 2013, and will focus resources on bringing to market and scaling up promising agricultural technologies that benefit smallholder farmers.