📋 Tender Overview
The Government of Niger and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) have recently signed the documentation for additional funding for the Family Farming Development Programme in the Maradi, Tahoua and Zinder regions and the Family Farming Development Programme in the Diffa region. The signatories were the Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance, Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine, on behalf of the Government of the Republic of Niger, and Bernard Hien, Regional Director of IFADs West and Central Africa Division.
The additional funding follows years of successful programme performance. Beneficial investments have been made in a number of areas and activities, including watershed management; adaptation of rainfed agriculture to climate change; promotion of irrigated crops; organizational and institutional strengthening of producers; support for womens leadership and improved nutritional security; development of commercial infrastructure; support for infrastructure management and development of cross-border trade.
With the additional funding to be provided by these programmes, IFAD and the Government will jointly scale up successful development investments to enable local people to undertake productive activities that improve their food security and foster resilient living conditions. Both programmes are considered flagship structural investments in the regions of intervention, said Bernard Hien, Regional Director of IFADs West and Central Africa Division.
Additional funding of US$40 million has been provided for the Family Farming Development Programme in the Diffa region, the initial intervention area of which will be extended to all municipalities in the region and four departments in the neighbouring Agadez region. This funding will assist 40,000 additional households (20,000 in the Diffa region and 20,000 in the Agadez region), bringing the total to 63,000 households. The aid will focus in particular on refugees, displaced persons and returnees, while maintaining a certain degree of equity with respect to the local population in order not to disrupt civil and social peace.
The second funding package, which is intended for the Family Farming Development Programme in the Maradi, Tahoua and Zinder regions and amounts to US$ 40 million, will allow the extension of interventions to three additional areas in the Dosso region. A total of 24 communities will benefit. Thanks to the additional funding, assistance will be provided to the 290,000 households initially planned, as well as to an additional 20,000 households in the rural areas of Dosso.
Taking into account additional funding, the total cost of the Family Farming Development Programme in the Maradi, Tahoua and Zinder regions amounts to US$ 286.1 million, and the total cost of the Family Farming Development Programme in the Diffa region amounts to US$ 116.7 million.
Both programmes aim to bring about a profound rural transformation based on strengthening sustainable family farming and market access, with a particular focus on poor rural communities. They aim to sustainably increase incomes, increase the capacity to adapt to climate change and improve market access for family farms, as well as promote the socio-economic integration of refugee or displaced populations in host communities. In this regard, they fit well with Nigers new vision for endogenous development, as set out in the Resilience Building Programme. The two development programmes also embody the commitment of IFAD and the entire United Nations system to support scalable investments to accelerate the transformation of food systems and the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
IFADs collaboration with Niger dates back to 1980, and has since implemented 15 programmes and projects, assisting at least 1.3 million households and financing totaling US$949.2 million.
