PFD's work in agriculture: Bosnia & Herzegovina | Nigeria | Cambodia

PFD’s programs in the field of agriculture and household economic and food security include community-based programming to support individual households with training and support. The objectives for this work include increasing agricultural efficiency, improving livestock health, promoting the growing of nutrient-rich vegetables in household gardens, and increasing access to credit and marketing opportunities. Partners for Development also manages national agricultural initiatives that seek to change policy and build institutions.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, PFD has been implementing programs in support of the agricultural sector since 1993. Since that time, the organization’s work has successfully moved from relief-based activities to development in the post-conflict country. For the past several years, the focus has been on building a sustainable organization to represent small-scale farmers in the Upper Vrbas region. More recently, national agricultural initiatives such as conferences and publications have been added to the program to form the Integrated Agricultural Development Program (IADP).

As an essential component, PFD has supported the creation of the Independent Farmers’ Association (IFA), a self-sustaining member organization reaching out to all ethnic communities and offering services designed to increase the marketing capabilities of the local farmers in this mountainous region. PFD has facilitated commercial partnerships between established business entities and the IFA. These commercial linkages have moved the development program from small-scale initiatives to major private-sector activity.

Through training and support, PFD has also facilitated the IFA’s work with KLAS, a local blue-chip food processing company, which has established ‘buy-off’ stations where IFA members have an arrangement to sell a range of products at a guaranteed price. IFA members can also capitalize on improved packaging and handling offered through Klas for the marketing of products internationally. The IFA, with PFD support, has also arranged for joint procurements where member farmers can purchase seed, equipment, and other agricultural inputs at a higher quality and a reduced price. Finally, PFD has negotiated lines of credit through UPI Bank, a large, national commercial bank, for the exclusive use of IFA members for their agricultural needs.

For more on PFD’s work in Bosnia & Herzegovina, click here.

Market access also poses significant problems for farmers in Nigeria, particularly in Benue and Nassarawa states. Both states are located in Nigeria’s central belt, an area composed mainly of ethnic minorities and where about 70% of the population is estimated to live in poverty. The region is also highly dependent on agriculture with an estimated four million of the five million living in these two states relying on farming and other work in the agricultural sector as their primary source of livelihood.

In this region, as in many parts of the developing world, self-perpetuating cycles of rural poverty can be linked to a lack of technical information and agricultural inputs such as fertilizer and seed, as well as the inability to access capital, credit, and markets for produce.

Many farmers in the region are isolated, and therefore, vulnerable to monopolistic traders because of a lack of transportation infrastructure, including, quite simply, roads. In response, Partners for Development has been working to improve feeder roads as a means of increasing farmers’ access to markets, and of increasing communities’ access to cheaper products. To date, PFD’s road and bridge improvements have benefited more than 260,000 local residents. PFD has worked through local communities to implement the road improvement projects and has ensured that infrastructure improvement projects can be sustained, maintained, and replicated by offering training to local partners in their management and maintenance.

Partners for Development will also be working with Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Agriculture on information outreach efforts to support the agricultural sector, including pamphlets and brochures as well as demonstrations of new and appropriate technology.

For more on PFD’s work in Nigeria, click here.

In Cambodia, approximately 40% of the population falls below the poverty line in rural areas and over 70% of household expenditures are for food. Caloric and micronutrient deficiencies in the Cambodian diet have led to a disproportionately high percentage of malnourished and underweight children. This in turn, is a major contributor to Cambodia’s extremely high under-five mortality rate of 12.4%.

Meanwhile, agriculture remains the most important economic activity for 94% of rural communities; therefore, improving productivity in this sector is critical to addressing poverty on a national basis.

In 2004, Partners for Development will begin a new project designed to improve household income, to improve livestock breeding methods, and to create better and more accessible agricultural extension and veterinary services.

Working within a participatory and peer-oriented framework, Partners for Development will be working to increase agricultural productivity by boosting private sector rice production with improved rice varieties and growing techniques, as well as improving the production of upland crops. Family nutrition will be improved through a focus on household vegetable gardening, nutrition education, and duck raising. Agricultural extension services will be strengthened through training and capacity-building, while access to markets will be increased through the establishment and support of local farmers’ associations.

For more on PFD’s work in Cambodia, click here.