Spotlight on VcCLIR: A USAID Value Chain-Specific Legal and Regulatory Analytical Tool
This is the fourth installment of the Feed the Future Enabling Environment for Food Security project’s analytical tools series. Check out the introductory post, the AgBEE tool profile and the AgCLIR methodology profile. Check back for the final analytical tool profile tomorrow!
For specific value chains, certain rules have greater priority over others. For example, streamlined seed licensing procedures may have little impact if priority value chains include traditionally open pollination varieties. And sometimes, access to credit may pose a challenge for lower-value products. That may, however, be a limited challenge if value chains are high-value export commodities. Export barriers may prove to be less critical for value chains with primarily domestic growth opportunities. Where value chains have been determined, the Value Chain Commercial Legal and Institutional Reform (VcCLIR) tool enables narrowly tailored analysis to identify priority constraints affecting the value chain and offers a rational process for developing a reform agenda driven by stakeholder priorities that can lead to inclusive, market systems growth.
VcCLIR Nuts and Bolts
VcCLIR was designed to help identify the policy, legal and institutional constraints that uniquely impact a specific value chain. It applies the rigorous, multidisciplinary analysis of an AgCLIR diagnostic (as noted in yesterday’s post) to a specific value chain, focusing across the whole value chain, from smallholder farmers to the end markets, to provide a clear understanding of the challenges to firm and farm growth for a specific commodity. VcCLIR focuses on to four to six key constraints to growth within the target value chain and incorporates a detailed analysis of the value chain, including the market structure, key players, a stakeholder map, and an overview of the role of women in the value chain and the specific constraints that they face. The flexibility and ability to look at a specific commodity can offer USAID and partners an evidentiary basis for a reform strategy as well as offer recommended steps to enhance project work planning and implementation.
Mali VcCLIR Case Study
In 2012, USAID/Mali invested in conducting a comprehensive VcCLIR across multiple value chains in the agricultural sector. Aggregated analysis, recommendations and an agenda for action were synthesized into the Value Chain Commercial, Legal and Institutional Reform Mali report highlighting the conditions and opportunities for agribusiness operations across the livestock, rice and millet/sorghum value chains, providing recommendations for further research and reform. This effort was paired with a Mali Recommendation Feasibility and Action Plan, which contains an outline of each recommendation, detailing why reform is needed, a description of the costs associated with the problem, obstacles to reform, the timeline for change and the resource commitments required to facilitate reform. Findings from these were also structured into a series of short briefs including the Livestock in Mali Value Chain Briefer, the Millet and Sorghum in Mali Value Chain Briefer and the Rice in Mali Value Chain Briefer to serve stakeholders with high-level recommendations and findings specific to that particular value chain and commodity.
The ability focus in on a specific value chain or commodity within the broader system can be particularly relevant as Missions and partners work with the private and public sector at the country level to support the Global Food Security Strategy and current and future Feed the Future programs.
To learn more about VcCLIR, please contact the Feed the Future Enabling Environment for Food Security project.