Interview Marie Jouffe

What role does the farmers’ welfare scheme have to play in the area of cooperation?

The farmers’ mutual welfare fund – the MSA - while having many values in common with the other social security schemes, is unique in that it wears two hats – one as a professional agricultural organisation with a participatory approach and the other as a social protection organisation with a public service remit. The mutual benefit aspect, whose legitimacy hinges on elections at the local level, gives the fund a strong grassroots reach. In the area of international cooperation, this translates into assistance to national authorities in developing social protection schemes tailored to the needs of the agricultural community, while fostering a grassroots approach working in partnership with farmers themselves.
In terms of know-how, the MSA has two original features - on the one hand a highly pragmatic approach to cooperation stemming from a long tradition of cooperation in the agricultural sector – and on the other, its status as a “one-stop-shop” meaning that, unlike other schemes, it both collects contributions and administers benefits, whether for sickness, old age or families. It even goes beyond social protection in the strictest sense of the term, providing a wide range of social welfare and local development programmes.

Can you give some examples of cooperation initiatives undertaken by MSA?

The different funds have been organising local initiatives for many years now. The MSA thus has long experience in the area of international cooperation, and in the nineteen nineties created a structure devoted exclusively to international projects. Let me give a few examples that provide some idea of our know-how and approach to this question. In Senegal, the MSA is helping to incorporate a social protection component in the law on agricultural and forestry policy, under a project initiated by the Senegalese and French ministries of agriculture. On this scheme we are working with the ILO and the National Council for Consultation of Rural Actors (CNCR), who are participating at the request of the Senegalese Government. And in Burkina Faso, we are helping the cotton growers’ union, UNPCB, to set up a mutual benefit scheme.
In Morocco, CCMSA currently has two ongoing projects. First, we’re assisting Morocco’s social security fund, CNSS, to encourage the affiliation of farm workers in their scheme and the declaration of their revenues. We are also supporting a local development project in eastern Morocco where young French female farmers (elected members of MSA) are helping local people in implementing development activities and running a local association.
Up to 2005, the MSA coordinated a twinning operation in Poland addressing the issue of early retirement in the agricultural sector, and conducted as part of the European Commission programme for accession candidate countries. For the purposes of the project, a member of the MSA’s management team spent two years as resident advisor in Poland, coordinating an operation that involved other French organisations such as CNASEA. This initiative was completed by a local social development project in five rural locations.

What are your expectations of GIP SPSI?

We operate with the GIP as a partnership. As our partner, we expect it to coordinate and structure the French cooperation offering in the area of social protection, without compromising the farming sector’s age-old capacity for initiative. The GIP will add value to France’s social welfare players by involving them in its missions abroad to anticipate and identify needs. It’s also well positioned to promote French know how and France’s service offering in the area of cooperation, leveraging the diverse range of resources available.