US$22.5 million grant will aim to improve food security and incomes of small farmers

Rome, 16 March 2012 – The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) will provide a US$22.5 million grant to the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire to help improve food security and incomes of smallholder producers with a particular focus on rural young people and especially women.

The grant agreement for the Support to Agricultural Production and Marketing Project was signed today by Janine Tagliante-Saracino, Ambassador of the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire to Italy, and Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of IFAD.

About two-thirds of the population in Cote d’Ivoire is engaged in farming, forestry and fishing sectors. The agriculture sector contributes to about 24 per cent to the country’s gross domestic product with rice, maize, cassava, plantains, yams as staple foods, and cocoa, coffee, timber, rubber and palm oil for export.

Despite the increasing importance of oil and gas production, the country’s economy is still highly dependent on agriculture. A long period of civil conflict has increased the vulnerability of poor rural people particularly small producers who do not have access to appropriate technologies, services and markets.

The new IFAD-supported project will provide sustainable rural development in the context of a post-crisis environment in Savanes, Bandama Valley and Zanzan regions in the North. To improve food security and household incomes in these regions, the project will enhance farm production by helping small producers to access improved seeds and mechanized equipment for tillage and harvesting.

In addition, the project will also support local processing of agricultural products through improved infrastructure and marketing, and will emphasize training and empowerment of smallholder farmer organizations. The project will help smallholders move towards profitable, market-influenced farming, in which the market determines the investment strategy and production choices.

Cofinanced by the government of Côte d’Ivoire, this new project will be implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture and benefit more than 25,000 poor rural households, including women and young people.

With this new project, IFAD will have financed nine programmes and projects in Côte d’Ivoire for a total investment of $99.2 million benefitting 523,000 households since 1984.

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Press release No.: IFAD/24/2012

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) works with poor rural people to enable them to grow and sell more food, increase their incomes and determine the direction of their own lives. Since 1978, IFAD has invested about US$13.7 billion in grants and low-interest loans to developing countries through projects empowering about 405 million people to break out of poverty, thereby helping to create vibrant rural communities. IFAD is an international financial institution and a specialized UN agency based in Rome – the United Nations’ food and agriculture hub. It is a unique partnership of 168 members from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), other developing countries and the Organization for Economic Co‑operation and Development (OECD)