Butana Integrated Rural Development Project

The Butana Integrated Rural Development Project is premised on the assertion that, in the Butana region, livestock production and marketing constitute the means to build up the assets of poorer smallholders, increase women’s economic role, and improve household food security and living conditions. Achieving this objective will require operating on two main fronts: (i) developing an improved governance framework for natural resources that is based on devolving natural resource management to user groups and aligning investments accordingly; (ii) improving smallholders’ access to livestock markets, and strengthening their bargaining position through the rehabilitation of market infrastructure, establishing market information systems and organizing producers’ groups of women and men.

The overall goal of the project will be to achieve a sustainable improvement in the livelihoods and drought-resilience of rural poor households. Its specific objectives include:

• establishing a coherent and cost-effective governance framework that ensures regulated access to land and water resources in the region;
• improving both women’s and men’s access to – and bargaining position in – livestock markets;
• developing the capacity of community-based organizations to engage in environmentally sound development initiatives that are gender- and socially equitable.

The target group is composed of smallholder agropastoralist households in the sand dune zone and in the clay plains, smallholder households engaged in irrigation, and smallholder transhumant households. The project area comprises approximately 100,000 households, and an estimated 80,000 households will benefit from the project.

Source: IFAD