DUSHANBE (TCA) — Tajikistan and the United Nations International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) last week signed an agreement to finance the Livestock and Pasture Development Project II (LPDP), an initiative that aims to reduce the vulnerability of pastoral communities to climate change threats.
The total cost of the project is estimated at US $24.2 million. The funding is comprised of an $8.7 million IFAD loan, an $8.7 million IFAD grant, and an additional $5 million grant from IFAD’s Adaptation for Smallholder Agriculture Programme (ASAP), the IFAD said in a press release. The government of Tajikistan will contribute an estimated $0.44 million while local participants will provide $0.85 million.
The agreement was signed in Rome by Abdusalom Qurboniyon, Minister for Finance of Tajikistan, and Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of IFAD.
LPDP II is the second phase of an already successful project which aims to reach an additional 38,000 rural households in five districts of Tajikistan’s Khatlon province. It will mainly target smallholder livestock farmers, private veterinary service providers, woman-headed households as well as women belonging to poor households. While the majority of farmers in Tajikistan today are women, the agriculture sector is also the largest employer of women. LPDP-II will continue to emphasize the role of women in agriculture while working to move them beyond subsistence farming into higher-value, market-oriented production.
“In addition to improving the livelihoods of Tajik pastoral communities, the project represents an important step forward in the collaboration between Tajikistan and IFAD,” said Frits Jepsen, Country Programme Manager for Tajikistan
The project’s goal is to contribute to the reduction of poverty in the region as well as to increase the nutritional status and incomes of targeted poor households by enhancing livestock productivity and resilience to climate change.
In particular, the project will focus on developing institutions for effective management of pasture resources by local communities, and enhancing productivity of livestock by improving animal health and nutrition.
Productivity of livestock is far below its potential in Tajikistan and will likely be worsened by climate change since pastures, hay yields and fodder crops are strongly influenced by weather patterns. Through a grant provided by IFAD’s climate fund, one of the tools that will enable livestock farmers to maximize the use of pastures is a monitoring and evaluation system of pasture productivity.
Since 2009, IFAD has invested a total of $48 million in programmes and projects in Tajikistan. This has generated a total investment of $55 million, benefiting 80,000 households.
