The Government of Niger and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) recently signed documents to bring additional financing to the Family Farming Development Programme in the regions of Maradi, Tahoua, Zinder (ProDAF MTZ) and for the Family Farming Development Programme in the regions of Diffa (ProDAF Diffa) respectively. The Prime Minister, Minister of Economy and Finance, Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine, on behalf of the Government of the Republic of Niger signed the agreements together with Bernard Hien, IFAD’s Regional Director for West, and Central Africa.
The additional funding comes after years of successful implementation of the PRODAF MTZ and ProDAF Diffa projects. Successful investments have been implemented related to a number of areas and activities including: watershed management; support to rain-fed agriculture; adaptation to climate change; development of irrigated crops; producers’ organizational and institutional strengthening; women’s leadership support and improving nutritional security; development of commercial infrastructures; infrastructure management support and development of cross-border exchange.
“Through additional financing to these projects, IFAD and the Government will jointly upscale successful development investments to enable the local population to carry out their production activities for improved food security and resilient living conditions. The two projects are highly regarded as flagship structural investments in regions of interventions.” said, Bernard Hien, IFAD’s Regional Director for West and Central Africa Regional.
Additional financing of US$40 million is earmarked for ProDAF Diffa, in which the initial intervention zone will be extended to all the communes of the Diffa region and four departments of the neighbouring Agadez region. The funds will allow an additional 40,000 households to be reached (20,000 for the Diffa region and 20,000 for the Agadez region), for a total of 63,000 households being reached overall. Refugees, displaced persons and/or returnees will be particularly targeted, considering the need for equity with the local population to maintain civil and social peace.
The second financing package of US$40 million will enable ProDAF MTZ to intervene in three regions, Maradi, Tahoua and Zinder, and will be extended to three areas in the Dosso region. A total of 24 communities will be targeted. The additional funding will enable the project to reach the 290,000 households initially targeted, as well as 20,000 rural households in Dosso.
The total cost of PRoDAF MTZ and ProDAF Diffa, including the additional financing is estimated at US$286.1 million and US$116.7 million.
ProDAF MTZ and ProDAF Diffa propose a profound rural transformation based on strengthening sustainable family farming and access to markets, putting poor rural communities at the centre of its interventions. They aim to sustainably improve incomes, adaptation to climate change and access to markets for family farms, and to ensure the socio-economic integration of refugee or displaced populations into host communities. In that respect, they align well with Niger’s new vision for endogenous development, as directed by the Resilience Program. They further represent a commitment from IFAD and the entire United Nations, to support scalable investments for accelerating the transformation of food systems and the Sustainable Development Goals.
IFAD has been collaborating with Niger since 1980, with 15 programmes and projects that have reached at least 1.3 million households and total financing of US$949.2 million.
