On Saturday, February 25, International Cooperation Minister Rania el Mashat and UN Resident Envoy in Egypt Elena Panova made an inspection tour of a sustainable agricultural investment project in Al-Wafaa village in western Samallout Township of Minya, Upper Egypt.
The project seeks to improve villagers’ living conditions. The $95 M project is being implemented in Minya, Beni Suef, and Aswan in Upper Egypt, as well as Kafr El Sheikh in the Nile Delta region, targeting 19,000 families in 30 villages.
It involves upgrading and rehabilitating basic infrastructure and cooperating with local communities to scale up social services and boost productivity by building relevant household capacities.
The three-themed project aims to reduce poverty and achieve food security by improving local communities, diversifying agricultural activity, and ensuring the availability of rural financial services.
It is part of a 2018-2022 developmental partnership agreement between the Egyptian government and the UN.
The International Cooperation Ministry is scheduled to ink a new partnership agreement for a similar period by mid-March.
During a meeting with a group of farmers participating in a farmer field school project as part of her tour, which aims to share the best practices and expertise related to boosting crop production by innovative climate-smart techniques, the minister had a conversation with the farmers who asked for organizing such kind of farmer field schools more often to derive more benefits from them.
Country representatives of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) accompanied Mashat during her tour.
