Africa-Press – Uganda. A supervision mission team from the International Fund for Agricultural Development(IFAD) has visited the National Oilseeds Project.
During the supervision meeting at Dove’s Nest Hotel in Gulu, deliberations between IFAD and the ministries went beyond the progress assessment.
The discussions explored into refined aspects of project implementation, addressing challenges faced by stakeholders on the ground. This collaborative problem-solving approach reflected a shared commitment to the project’s success and the welfare of those it seeks to uplift.
The implementation guidelines put forth during this mission are poised to be a compass, directing the stakeholders towards a harmonized and efficient execution of the National Oilseeds Project.
The IFAD team encouraged NOSP Staff to create successful collaboration with beneficiaries and partners, be dedicated, and build a shared vision for transforming agricultural landscapes and livelihoods of the local people.
The main objective of this mission was to evaluate the overall progress of the project and impart crucial implementation guidelines to the project partners. IFAD’s team worked in tandem with government bodies, fostering a co-operation
The National Oil Seed Project’s strategy is to construct 2500 Km of community access roads within the project area, to advance local level transportation infrastructure and ease the commercialization of the oil seeds sector.
All the roads have already been identified through a consultative and participatory process involving the beneficiary communities, the sub-counties and the districts.
The roads identification process prioritized provision of access to oil seeds production areas while taking into reflection the status of the existing road network.
NOSP has already boarded on the development of engineering designs for the road construction and is collecting data through monitoring and evaluation process from the selected districts to gain insights into market access challenges.
In a related development, the National Oilseeds Project held a workshop to review batch A draft engineering designs for 1082km community access roads for their upgrading to district class 111 road standard with the selected district project team from all 81 districts across the country at Royal Suites Hotel Bugolobi.
The project coordinator urged the district local governments to support the project interventions and to stay focused on project’s mission.
He further noted that district local governments have a role in procurement, supervision, and certification of the project works.
Talking about the project progress, he said that to implement the road sub-projects efficiently, the 2,500Km of community access roads have been divided into two batches including Batch A roads totaling an estimate of 1,000Km and Batch “B” roads totaling an estimate of 1,500Km.
The Project has already boarded on baseline and feasibility studies in the six hubs to generate necessary information for project management and has conducted in-house designs for the initial 1,000km of roads.
The exercise was aimed at developing the engineering designs for road construction and collecting data through monitoring and evaluation processes from local communities to gain insights into market access challenges.
The community access roads and their upgrading will be to district class 111 road standard to principally make the drainage structures resilient against heavy vehicle use and ensuring longevity.
The project anticipates several benefits, including boosting oilseed production and improved access to road Infrastructure that directly impacts on access to market and the value addition processing facilities there by facilitating competition from oilseed buyers and reduce transportation costs to all stakeholders through improvements to community access roads serving selected areas with NOSP-clustered oilseed producer groups.
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