Indian Horticulture Development Alliance (IHDA)
Sponsored by
The Institute of International Agriculture and Michigan State University have been successful in the India PIKA competition and the proposal for the Indian Horticulture Development Alliance (IHDA) has been funded. The award started Oct 1, 2008, with end date Sept 30, 2010 and is funded by USAID, coupled with leveraged funding from Indian partners (industry, government, commodity exchanges, agri-banks, university) and other partners such as GlobalGAP and CIES. Drs. Thiagarajan and Bourquin of MSU will lead this interdisciplinary effort in developing value chains in India.
Program summary
The Indian Horticulture Development Alliance (IHDA) is a comprehensive and inclusive coalition established to address India’s major horticultural development goals. It will help build value chains for horticulture products with high potential for expanded distribution and sales in India’s rapidly-evolving food retail sector and high value export markets. The Alliance’s overarching goals are to:
1) improve smallholder producers’ capabilities to meet emerging horticulture market demands and increase their net returns;
2) develop small and medium-scale enterprises engaged in horticultural processing and value addition;
3) contribute tangibly to sustainable capacity building in public and private Indian institutions;
4) establish a scalable Indian horticulture knowledge network platform to share technical value chain information and leading practices between producers, small and medium businesses, and supporting institutions; and
5) contribute to the participation of women and other traditionally disadvantaged groups in all these efforts.
The Alliance partners will utilize an integrated value-chain development approach to assess and identify horticultural market opportunities, constraints and intervention activities and deliver market development activities and cross-cutting support services.
The Alliance partners will draw upon extensive Indian horticulture market development experience to establish a participatory approach to system-wide development in selected horticulture value chains. We will ensure sustainability by strengthening Alliance partners, value chain partners and producer capabilities.
Partners
IHDA partners comprise leading public and private organizations engaged throughout the Indian horticulture value chain from production to final marketing and include:
- Michigan State University – Lead Institution for USAID-Funded Activities
- Government of India Ministries and State Departments (Agriculture / National Horticulture Mission, Commerce and Industry / APEDA, Food Processing Industries, State Marketing Boards, State Horticulture Missions)
- Tamil Nadu Agricultural University
- Confederation of Indian Industry (CII)
- YES Bank
- Safal National Exchange (SNX) / Multi-Commodity Exchange (MCX)
- GlobalGAP
The core Alliance partners will collaborate with other strategic partners at all levels of targeted value chains as needed, including grower groups and cooperatives, input suppliers, universities and research institutions, domestic food retailers and wholesalers, exporters, processors, certification bodies and NGOs.
