The US Agency for International Development (USAID) held a ceremony on Friday showcasing a successful agricultural programme that shared modern techniques with 27,000 farmers and helped to increase agricultural exports by $34 million. The USAID’s agribusiness project worked with both small farmers and larger producers to increase productivity and quality while reaching new domestic and international markets. The four-year programme, which ends this month, created jobs for 14,000 Pakistanis. “The farmers of Pakistan have tremendous potential and USAID is committed to supporting farmers in adopting modern best practices and technologies,” USAID Mission Director John Groarke said at the ceremony.
Some of the programme’s achievements include a 300 percent increase in income for 800 women who process apricots in Gilgit-Baltistan, an improvement in the quality of chilies from Pakistan, and improvements in cuts of meat for the international export market.
The USAID is continuing to support market-led growth in the horticulture and livestock value chains through a recently launched US-Pakistan partnership for agriculture market development.
The US assistance has reached more than 8,00,000 rural households and financed irrigation initiatives for more than 4,80,000 acres of farmland in Pakistan. The United States helps Pakistani agribusinesses access financing, form partnerships, and tap into more lucrative markets with the goal of linking thousands of local producers nationwide to major commercial firms by the end of 2016. More than 26,000 new jobs can be attributed to USAID programming in the last four years.