BANGUI, June 21, 2023-/African Media Agency(AMA)/ — Nearly 700,000 Central Africans will benefit from an additional $50 million World Bank grant aimed at increasing food production and building the resilience of smallholders and food-insecure households in the Central African Republic.
The Urgent Response Project to the Food Crisis in the Central African Republic (PRUCAC) supports stabilization efforts for better resilience and will help the CAR to sustainably address the root causes of fragility. The project will help increase household food production and nutrition through links to markets. More than 465,000 smallholder farmers and food-insecure people will benefit from cash-for-work activities and the rehabilitation of small-scale agricultural infrastructure. This additional donation will make it possible to extend project activities to the prefectures of Lobaye, Sangha Mbaere and Mboumou, in addition to Bangui and the six prefectures initially covered, namely Nana Gribizi, Ouham, Basse Kotto, Haute Kotto, Mambere- Kadei and Ouaka.
CAR is currently facing a severe food crisis, with almost half of the population undernourished. Furthermore, the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, rising fuel, food and other import costs are aggravating the crisis. The country is ranked 120th out of 121 on the Global Hunger Index. The crisis is affecting the country’s economy, as agriculture is a major source of income and employment, risking to aggravate the already high poverty rate.
“This support will consolidate the achievements already recorded by the project while improving food production to break the cycle of dependency on food aid,” has indicated Guido Rurangwa, the World Bank Resident Representative in CAR. « Efforts will be made for the production of nutrient and micronutrient rich foods emphasizing small scale production of nutritious foods in home gardens to reduce malnutrition “, he added.
The project will be implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture. Funding is a grant from the International Development Association (IDA)*.
* The International Development Association (IDA) is the World Bank institution that helps the world‘s poorest countries. Founded in 1960, it provides grants and loans at low or no interest to finance projects and programs that stimulate economic growth, reduce poverty and improve the lives of the poor. IDA is a major source of aid for the world‘s 76 poorest countries, 39 of which are in Africa. Its resources concretely benefit 1.6 billion people. Since its inception, IDA has supported development activities in 113 countries. The annual volume of its commitments is constantly increasing and has averaged $21 billion over the past three years, with around 61% of this amount going to Africa.
Distributed by African Media Agency (AMA) for World Bank.
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Source : African Media Agency (AMA)