Agribusiness Market Scan (Mosul and surroundings)

Cordaid is a Dutch NGO with over 100 years of experience. Cordaid works in and on fragility, which means that our work focus is on fragile and post-conflict affected settings addressing five thematic focus areas, with one of these areas being Private Sector Development (PSD).

Through Cordaid’s Private Sector Development programmes, Cordaid fosters inclusive economic growth by acting as agents of change – designing and facilitating private sector ecosystems to catalyse sustainable growth. Cordaid’s work includes M4P, value chain development, business incubation and accelerator programmes, youth employment programmes and financial inclusion.

Cordaid recognizes that youth employment presents a major challenge in Iraq, as youth make up around 60 percent of Iraq's nearly 40 million people. While the World Bank says the youth unemployment rate reaches 20 percent in Iraq, the International Monetary Fund estimates the rate to be more than double this and in some areas of the country unemployment rates are said to even reach more than 60%.

Overall objective

The overall objective of this market assessment is to identify the subsectors of Agribusinesses with greatest potential for SME growth, understanding the main constraints to growth and major opportunities for expansion of SMEs within those. The study should examine SMEs, value chains, market demand patterns, market opportunities, primarily at national and regional level, that can benefit youth and women in and around Mosul. The intention is to identify those economic sub-sectors with the highest potential for the employment, providing specific, relevant, updated, detailed and reliable advice on most viable businesses with a special focus on value-added activities.

The market scan will be a study that includes primary research (for example: interviewing SME owners) and also analyzing secondary data (data regarding business development / employment generation in specific sectors). The market scan should look beyond the economic factors and take account of the political and social embeddedness of SME’s, and indicate conflict-related concerns which could be critical for the success of interventions aimed at supporting businesses in a later stage.

The market scan is expected to:

Give context, by:

• Describing the main sectors (including but not limiting to Agriculture), size and to what extent they drive (youth) employment in Mosul and its surroundings

• Describing how many firms of different sizes (micro, small, medium and large) exist by sector

• Identifying the areas (towns/neighborhoods/communities) of conflict / heightened security threats

• Describing the regulatory policies relevant to SMEs (taxes, costs to start businesses) and how these constrain or assist business owners

• Describing the relevant infrastructure (access to telecom, electricity, infrastructure) for business owners in Mosul and its surroundings and how these constrain or assist business owners

• Describing the levels of youth unemployment among the different locations / communities

• Describing the levels of education of youth, and how these differ by location / community

• Describing the largest employers for youth/women in the region

Focus on Agribusiness, by:

• Providing an overview (incl. a map with locations) of Agribusiness in Nineveh, snapshot summary of major businesses could include e.g. the locations, assets, revenues, number of employees, number of youth/women employed, type of products, end-users/markets, type of legal entity.

• Identifying the main sub-sectors / types of Agribusinesses, and for each:

o Identify the key skills required by the agribusinesses

o Identify the challenges for private sector growth

o Identify the levels of economic inclusion (gender / youth / cultural background)

o Identify the major obstacles to increased youth employment