Press release number: IFAD 34/02

Rome, Wednesday 17 July 2002 – A USD 16.14 million project in the State of Eritrea, the ‘Gash Barka Livestock and Agricultural Development Project’, will receive a USD 10.00 million loan and a USD 3.5 million Belgian Survival Fund Joint Programme grant from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). A loan and financing agreement was signed today at the Fund’s Headquarters by Mr. Petros Tseggai, Chargé d’Affaires, Embassy of the State of Eritrea and Mr. Lennart Båge, President of IFAD.

The project area is Gash Barka zoba, which is administratively subdivided into 14 sub-zobas. Gash Barka zoba is part of the Sudano-Sahelian agroclimatic zone and covers 27% of the country’s total land area. Two seasonal rivers, the Gash and the Barka, cross the zoba and provide essential access to underground water as well as grazing and browsing for livestock during the dry season. The region’s pastoralist and agropastoralist people are poor because they depend on low productivity crop and livestock enterprises, have few other income-generating opportunities and have limited access to safe drinking water and health services. Rainfall is limited and unreliable and droughts cause partial or complete crop failure as often as one year in three on average. In years of crop failure, people must sell their livestock for household survival and about half of the population depends on food donations. The zoba has been adversely affected by the recent war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which led to loss of household assets, destruction of infrastructure and restrictions on seasonal movements of livestock.

The objective of the project is to reduce poverty among the targeted population through locally determined investments in people’s livestock and crop production enterprises and improved access to drinking water and health services. The project’s primary target group is 16 000 households, who will benefit from support for livestock and crop production and improved access to drinking water. In addition, the community-based and the public health care systems will be strengthened, thereby improving access to health services potentially benefiting the entire population of Gash Barka Zoba. The project will be implemented by the Gash Barka Zoba Administration, whose capacity will be strengthened as part of project implementation.

Key investments will be: community-managed rangeland development, including establishment of exclusion areas, construction of water points, development of village based livestock support services; small stream and river diversion and water harvesting for supplementary irrigation; farmer’s field-based crop research; drinking water supply development; health services against malaria, tuberculosis, and mother-child health problems; and institutional capacity building;

With the project, IFAD will have financed two projects in Eritrea, for a total loan amount of USD 22.7 million and a total Belgian Survival Fund Joint Program grant amount of USD 8.8 million.

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IFAD is a specialized agency of the United Nations with the specific mandate of combating hunger and poverty in the most disadvantaged regions of the world. Since 1978 IFAD has financed 603 projects in 115 recipient countries and in the West Bank and Gaza for a total commitment of approximately USD 7.3 billion in loans and grants. Through these projects, about 250 million rural people have had a chance to move out of poverty. IFAD makes the greater part of its resources available to low-income countries on very favorable terms, with up to 40 years for repayment and including a grace period of up to ten years and a service charge of 0.75% per year.