Ifad awards loan to help raise incomes of 1m poor Bangladeshi farmers

05-Sep-2016 - Last updated on 06-Sep-2016 at 07:13 GMT

Related tags Poverty

Bangladesh’s government has signed an agreement with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (Ifad) in a bid to increase the incomes more than 1m poor farming households in the country by increasing agricultural production and improving access to markets.

Ifad will provide US$23.86m as a loan to fund a US$214m programme that will cover most of the country and span a broad range of agro-ecological zones across Bangladesh.

“In Bangladesh, poverty in rural areas is still three times higher than in urban areas. Under the new programme, farming households will benefit directly or indirectly from extension services, hands-on training and on-farm demonstrations of climate-smart technologies and applied research,” said Hubert Boirard, Ifad’s country programme manager.

The programme will also strengthen the capacity of Bangladesh’s agricultural research network to develop agricultural technologies aimed at increasing farm productivity and reducing post-harvest losses.

It will promote farmer groups and producer organisations and link them to existing markets, provide support for the sustainable development of inland fish farms, and ensure that a significant proportion of direct beneficiaries are women.

Since 1978, Ifad has invested almost $720m in 31 projects in Bangladesh, benefitting more than 10m households.