AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE Tanzania Agricultural Development Bank (TADB) and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) yesterday met in Dar es Salaam to discuss the opportunities in farming for women and youth and ways of promoting the struggling groups in the country’s agriculture value chain.
The forum is part of week-long activities to mark this year’s International Women’s Day—an annual event which is celebrated on March 8.
The talks were held between TADB’s Managing Director Japhet Justine and WFP Country Representative in Tanzania, Sarah Gordon-Gibson. She was accompanied by WFPs Head of Supply Chain Management Riaz Lodhi.
“It is a pleasure to be back in Tanzania, a country, which is full of natural resources and so much potential. I am really looking forward on working with TADB to improve the agricultural value-chain in Tanzania, and see how we can impact more farmers, especially women and youth who are the backbone of poverty alleviation and to the development of the nation,” said Gibson.
For his part, Justine welcomed a fresh partnership with the UN organisation, emphasizing WFP’s role on providing technical assistance in order to improve the efficiency and impact of current and potential projects by the bank.
“We need to build models, institutionalize agriculture so that it can be sustainable. That is why we are interested in forming alliances with development partners such as WFP to achieve that. To build not for the moment but for the future,” emphasized Justine during the discussion.
According to a statement issued by TADB the two sides held cordial talks, focusing on promotion of women and youth participation in the farming value chain, promotion of WFP technical assistance in strengthening projects supported by the bank, and facilitating the overall value-addition of the agricultural and food industry in Tanzania.
Last year, the two parties partnered in implementing the Farm to Market Alliance (FTMA) project which seeks to boost the agriculture sector and explored ways to scale up the FTMA model and have more smallholders under the arrangement.
The platform enabled TADB to loan 750m/- or 330,000 US dollars to maize farmer groups with a total of 867 farmers and about 2,789 acres in southern highlands, Ruvuma and Rukwa regions. TADB agreed to manage a fund that promotes innovation in rural Tanzania while WFP pledged to be the field hub of innovation.
