Contacts: In Washington: R.McColgan-Arnold +1 202 473 8302 rmccolgan@worldbank.org In Yaoundé: Henri Laurent Bateg (237) 22 20 38 15 hbateg@worldbank.org WASHINGTON, June 18, 2009 – The World Bank Board of Executive Directors today approved a US$60 million equivalent Agricultural Competitiveness Project in Cameroon.
The Project’s objective is to increase the competitiveness of eligible producer organizations working on target value chains. Concentrating its activities in target areas with high growth potential, it is expected that the project will result in increased value of marketed production through increased productivity, quality, and marketing of productions. Agriculture contributes more than half of Cameroon non-oil export revenues and employs almost 60 percent o f the economically active population. Ninety percent of all rural households are to some extent engaged in agriculture and approximately one third of them earn their living from export crops. Market-oriented smallholders and their organizations--around 20,000 rice producers in rehabilitated irrigation perimeters and 20,000 direct promoters of economic partnerships-projects—will be the primary target. However, the project is anticipated to have a significant impact on a number of other beneficiaries, such as: (i) the population living in high potential production areas benefiting from the rehabilitation of rural roads; (ii) other actors along the value chains (traders, transporters, agro-industries, etc.) who would benefit from increased quality and quantity of products, as well as from reduced transport costs; and (iii) smallholders in targeted areas who would receive indirect benefits from the project activities. “The Project would target six value chains considered strategic both for food security and for their comparative advantage on the regional markets, with due consideration to interventions already ongoing or planned» Said Renato Nardello the Task Team Leader of the project. The target value chains are rice, maize, plantain, palm oil, pork, and poultry. “The choice of the value chains i s based on the results of the Bank-supported “Agricultural Value Chain Analysis, which strongly supported maize, plantain, palm oil and village-level poultry. In addition to these value chains, the Project will target (i) pork, because of its strong complementarily with the maize and poultry value chains, and (ii) rice, because o f its strategic relevance and important underused potential”. The Project would intervene in six of the ten regions of Cameroon: (i) Center, (ii) North-West, (iii) Far North, (iv) North, (v) East, (vi) West, and (vii) Littoral. Selection of target areas is based on the potential of the selected value chains and on the need to harmonize interventions with other projects to avoid duplications and overlapping. The project has four components: § Component 1: Rehabilitating Key Rural Infrastructure (US$21.5 million IDA) § Component 2: Economic Partnerships (US$22.7 million IDA). § Component 3: Institutional support and capacity development (US$5.0 million IDA). § Component 4: Project coordination, monitoring and evaluation (US$7.4 million IDA). Around 500km of rural roads and 12,000 hectares of irrigated perimeters will be rehabilitated with project funds with attention being paid to ensure that sustainable mechanisms for the operation and maintenance of infrastructure are adopted. For instance, rural roads rehabilitated by the Project would be inscribed in the national “priority list” for the allocation of budget resources for road maintenance. A core element of the project is the support to technically and financially solid subprojects presented by producer organization, enabling farmers to increase sales and incomes, the main gauge of sustainability. For more information on the World Bank’s work in Africa visit: http://www.worldbank.org/afr/ For more information on the World Bank’s work in Cameroon visit: http://www.worldbank.org/cameroon
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