Release number IFAD/06/08

Rome, 26 January 2008 – The prime Minister of Yemen, Ali Mohammed Mujawar, will meet Matthew Wyatt, Assistant President of IFAD, when Wyatt arrives in Sana’a today on a three-day official visit to Yemen. During his stay in Yemen, Wyatt will also meet the Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation, Abdul Karim Ismaël Al-Arhabi; the Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation, Mansur Ahmed Al-Hawshabi and other senior government officials.

The main purpose of Wyatt’s visit is to discuss rural poverty programmes and IFAD’s new Country Strategic Opportunities Programme with key officials in the country. This programme includes four project proposals - the Al Baida Development Project, the South-west Coastal Zone Development Project, the Lahij Area Development Project and the Taiz Rural Development Project.

IFAD’s investments aim to assist Yemen in realizing its Development Plan for Poverty Reduction 2006-2010 by mobilizing cofinancing and strengthening partnerships with other international and regional development organizations and financial institutions.

IFAD’s interventions in the poorest and most marginalized parts of the country aim to increase and diversify production, improve food self-sufficiency and raise the incomes of poor rural households. Since 1979, IFAD has invested about US$191 million in 19 rural development projects in Yemen, benefiting almost 56,000 poor families. With cofinancing, the total cost of these projects is about US$600 million.

There are currently four IFAD-supported projects in Yemen. In addition, the recently-approved Rainfed Agriculture and Livestock Project will begin early this year. It will help reverse the accelerating natural resource degradation in the poorest areas of the governorates of Al-Mahweet, Hajjah, Hodeidah, Lahej and Sana'a. Worth a total of US$42.2 million, including IFAD’s low-interest loan of US$16.6 million, the project will help about 185,000 poor households currently facing severe drought and water scarcity as a result of climate change.

Wyatt and IFAD’s Country Programme Manager for Yemen, Abdallah Rahman, will visit an IFAD-supported project in Yemen’s Western Governorate of Dhamar. The IFAD delegation will hold talks with the Governor of Dhamar, project staff and beneficiaries.

The Dhamar Participatory Rural Development Project, which started in 2004, is helping farmers increase and diversify production in order to secure basic food supplies, produce marketable surpluses and supply produce to local markets. The project is empowering villagers, especially women, by ensuring that poor people are involved in planning and implementing the project’s development activities. At a total cost of US$22.7 million, including IFAD’s investment of US$14 million, the project is helping achieve food security and improved incomes for 26,000 subsistence farming families in Dhamar. The project is also providing support for off-farm income-generating activities.

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IFAD was created 30 years ago to tackle rural poverty, a key consequence of the droughts and famines of the early 1970s. Since 1978, IFAD has invested almost US$10 billion in low-interest loans and grants that have helped more than 300 million very poor rural women and men increase their incomes and provide for their families.

IFAD is an international financial institution and a specialized United Nations agency. It is a global partnership of OECD, OPEC and other developing countries. Today, IFAD supports more than 200 programmes and projects in 84 developing countries.