Here I will be documenting my experiences throughout my 8-week internship in the Philippines at the International Rice Research Institute, as well as plenty of exploration and activities outside of work.
I do not have much editing capability in terms of formatting a homepage, so here is what I recommend to best navigate the site and my content.
This current page will hold every single one of my posts in backward chronological order. Visit my “Blog” page to read individual posts documenting both my work and life experiences, respectively, each week. While my posts do include plenty of pictures, I’ve been snapping shots nonstop throughout my travels and my camera roll is overflowing! Visit my “Gallery” page for even more pictures of my daily life and adventures with friends.
Feel free to leave plenty of comments on my posts, and thank you so much for visiting my blog!
After being dropped off by Tito Mon, one of my office managers, Gerran, showed me around the Portfolio Development and Management Office, or the PDMO. Although most of my team wasn’t there in person because they were either traveling for work or conducting business from home, I was introduced to members of the two other divisions within our office.
In the conference room, Gerran sat me down for an orientation about what they do in the PDMO, their place in the interworkings of IRRI, and what I could expect to be doing during my time here. As he explained it to me, the PDMO is broken up into 3 parts: Business Development (where I will be working!), Portfolio Development, and Portfolio Management. The work that the office does as a collective begins in the BDO and travels through to the PDO, eventually landing at the PMO.
Although they seem like cut-and-dry hand-offs, there is constant collaboration and oversight as things flow throughout the office. Generally, the PDMO secures funding, contracts, and the necessary paperwork for the projects and research being conducted at and through IRRI’s many international offices. They are in communication with various government offices and organizations and work to maintain those relationships after IRRI projects have been completed. Even though we’re stationed at the headquarters, we do work and have responsibilities for IRRI locations abroad.
The BDO researches projects relating to agriculture, food security and nutrition, and climate change worldwide to identify potential funding opportunities for IRRI. They look at government-funded projects, especially in the 17 countries where we have offices, projects funded by multilateral donors (international banks or development funds), and projects funded by bilateral donors (countries providing funding for developing countries). The projects that the BDO seeks out and tracks can be active projects that are currently being implemented, or pipeline projects that are still in the works or being developed. Many of these can take several years to even begin being put into action, so the work that the BDO does is often very long-term. They also look to see what sector the project is focused on, the amount of funding, the strategies for implementation, and the desired impact of the project. They research the strategies and goals of the multilateral and bilateral donors, ensuring that they are in line with IRRI’s mission. The members of my team in the BDO are constantly thinking about a million different things before they happen, as they’re happening, and after they have already passed through our unit.
To do this effectively and efficiently, they must have up-to-date and accurate information about their various donors and the countries that they work in. This is where the central task of my internship comes into play. My job is to conduct market research on each of the countries partnered with IRRI and centralize the information into an accessible brief. Each research brief includes the specific country’s background in agriculture, agricultural challenges they are currently facing, their individual agricultural strategy, how much money is allocated from their budget to the agriculture and development sectors, and what active agricultural projects the government is currently conducting. This beginning overview of the country itself can highlight potential opportunities for IRRI and clarify if what our scientists are working on applies to the country’s challenges and is feasible with its budget. I then tackle both the multilateral and bilateral donors operating in the country, noting the total amount of funding they provide, their partnership strategy with the country’s government, any pipeline projects, and then a breakdown of each individual active project, including its funding, duration, and general objective and implementation techniques. IRRI has longstanding relationships with many multilateral donors, and having information on what type of projects they are currently supporting can let the BDO have an idea of if they would be interested in any of IRRI’s current projects. Finally, I address the bilateral donors, listing the amount of aid the top 10 countries have provided over the last five years, and then following up with specifics for the top 5 countries’ average project size and the number of projects, which government agency is in charge of handling this agricultural funding, and what areas of agriculture and development they typically support. And while I am taking down all of this information, I am also tasked with identifying potential opportunities for IRRI and personal recommendations.
On Thursday I was given my first assignment, along with a projected schedule of those that would follow. I was to begin my research with our countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, starting with Burundi. One of the poorest and yet most densely populated countries in the world, Burundi’s agricultural challenges generally surround their rapidly increasing population that surpasses their rates of agricultural production. With just that information about the country, one could easily come to that conclusion, but after diving into my research, examining through the lens of agriculture and climate change, I learned of the extreme impact of soil erosion in this already small country and how it is tearing away at the arable land. I also learned that while farming is a primary source of the Burundi food supply, as opposed to pastoralism or fisheries, the specific types of crops that they grow are not sufficiently nutritious, leading to dangerously high rates of malnutrition and stunted growth amongst children.
On Friday I met with my supervisor, Melinda, and we discussed some of why I decided to apply to this internship and what I wanted to get out of it. I will tell you all what I told her: Ultimately, I would like to work in the international sphere, although the specifics are still flexible as I learn more about what options are out there. I am currently interested in international law, though environmental law and human rights law both pique my interest. I have also looked into political analysis, most likely with the State Department as a Foreign Service Officer, as I enjoy analyzing current events and developing policies and then making connections to their possible outcomes or effects. And the more time I spend at IRRI, the more interested I am becoming in working for an NGO, as they often deal with many country’s governments and other international organizations, and the impact that they have with their respective projects can really have such an impact on populations all over the world. Each of these possibilities requires international collaboration, and that is what I specified to Melinda that I was most curious to see up close at IRRI.
Without skipping a beat, Melinda tasked me with transcribing minutes for a Zoom meeting for a technical development team she is on that is a collaboration with ASEAN and CGIAR. ASEAN, an association of Southeast Asian countries, and CGIAR, a research partnership that IRRI is a part of that works on projects generally focused on food security, work together in this team on food-related projects in Southeast Asia. With 10 members tuning each, each got to talking about what they have been doing, such as attending workshops on biodiversity and the implementation of sustainable agriculture roadmaps, as well as the development of each of their own intervention packages, or project groups they are working on. It was so insightful to see all of the behind-the-scenes work, such as the politics of getting approval from institutions to put projects into action. The members went down the line and gave an update on where they are in their respective operations.
A common issue that a few members raised was in regards to budgetary concerns. Since CGIAR institutions are non-profits, quite a lot of work goes into securing funding to implement the many projects they are working on. I got to witness some of the research I had just started in action once they started discussing bilateral funds. The information these donors put on their websites is often brief and straightforward, but the process of securing that funding is hard work and often involves many stipulations, as I came to learn. And although they sometimes provide millions of dollars for certain projects, that is not always enough for these large, international operations. It was really interesting to see the bending, stretching, and compromising these non-profits do to make it work. I also learned of another funding mechanism and the different requirements to be eligible, highlighting some of the exclusivity that is present in these large-scale operations with generous sums of money being passed around. There was also more general talk about business activities and program launches, though I was still taken aback when they casually discussed coordinating with a large country’s Ministry of Agriculture. I am still settling into being at such a large international institution and coming to terms with the magnitude of some of the work done here, but for the others, meeting with government agencies is just another Tuesday.
The day flew by as this meeting kept me fully engaged as I was given the inside look I had been searching for. Getting to take these minutes gave me a greater insight into the work that NGOs do and the efforts that often go unseen.
After completing the minutes of the meeting, I resumed my research on Burundi, tackling its multilateral donors. Many developing countries have projects funded by World Bank, as they are a global institution, but there are also funds that come from regional operations. In Africa, that is typically the African Development Bank, which provides funding for various projects geared toward the development of African nations with a focus on poverty reduction and improving overall quality of life. The work that they do spans across sectors, addressing issues of climate change, economic inclusion and opportunities, electricity and industrialization, gender equality, and, what IRRI is most interested in, agriculture and rural development. Another donor that reappears quite frequently throughout my research due to IRRI’s specific focus is the International Fund for Agricultural Development, which is both a financial institution and agency of the United Nations that supports rural people all over the globe. Agriculture often provides their primary source of both food and employment, so IFAD looks to improve and strengthen the security of both to address the challenges that these people are facing, such as extreme poverty, hunger, and malnutrition.
When learning more about the projects these multilateral donors are putting tens of millions of dollars into, I noticed a trend of working to make these rural populations more “climate-resilient.” Many of the difficulties that these people are facing stem from changes to our climate; it was very eye-opening to read more about the effects of climate change in a small country, far from where I live, that I honestly did not know much about. People in the West tend to characterize climate change as something far in the future that will affect us all at once, but that is because Westerners do not experience it the way that others have been for decades. Due to the change in climate, the weather in Burundi has become unpredictable and unstable, drying out some areas and flooding others. This, coupled with the country’s soil erosion problem, has put many rural farmers out of work because they either cannot protect their farms from weather shocks, or they have lost their farms completely. This is catastrophic, as Burundi is already one of the poorest countries in the world, is almost completely reliant on its farmers, and suffers from chronic food insecurity. Most of the projects being implemented in Burundi are introducing things such as climate-resilient technology to better train and support farmers, ensuring that they will have a consistent and sustainable crop yield. As a result of this training and technology, new jobs and income-generating opportunities arise and entrepreneurialism is promoted, all of which contribute to the reduction of both rural poverty and food insecurity.
Although the process of locating all of these projects and their specific details was very tedious, it was never not insightful, and I would frequently get lost in learning and all of the new information.
working from home
The final element to be completed of my first research brief was the bilateral donors, and this may have been my most time-consuming task yet. This was largely because I was still unfamiliar with many of the terms and details that I was working with. There were moments when I didn’t fully understand the concept or meaning behind what I was looking for and therefore had trouble finding it; even though the internet is full of information and resources, it’s difficult to find what you are looking for if you don’t know how to look for it!
After a few trips down some rabbit holes and eventually some help, I began to find some of the information that I needed. I found the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development’s statistics database to be quite helpful once I determined how to narrow down their massive amount of information to what I was actually looking for. This, however, gave me a false sense of security as, once I established the top 5 donors, the research process became murky once more. It was tricky to navigate more of the government sites, as they don’t always make it easy to find information about their funding habits or, once the agricultural sector is specified, what exact areas of agriculture their projects fall under. I was also unfamiliar with many of the governments I was researching, such as Belgium, the Netherlands, and Norway, and not knowing the names of their government agencies or departments, again, made them difficult to find.
the OECD database
Slowly but surely, I completed my research and my first market research brief was done. I don’t have an agricultural background, so it was very interesting to learn more about what is being done to assist farmers, especially in another country with a different diet and climate than my own. From a political science standpoint, it was intriguing to see some of the influence of colonialism in the projects and funding today. Burundi had, for decades, been a German and then Belgian colony conjoined with Rwanda, its neighbor to the North. After gaining independence in 1962 and then splitting into respective states, Burundi underwent multiple genocides and over a decade-long civil war. Similar to Rwanda, much of the conflict stemmed from tensions between the Hutu and Tutsi groups present in both countries. Burundi is still feeling the effects of the violence today and it has certainly contributed to the country’s low economic standing. When researching the bilateral donors, it was interesting to learn that the top two largest contributing donors are Belgium and Germany, the former colonizers of this state, and the projects that they are funding to promote more financial inclusion for those excluded from income-generating opportunities are generally in response to the tensions between the Hutu and Tutsis that they themselves exacerbated during their respective imperialist reigns. Perhaps this is typical of former colonialist powers and I was simply unaware, but I still found it notable that the two European countries still have their hand in Burundian life nearly six decades after the country of Burundi gained its independence.
