AfDB approves €73.2mn for Congo to set up agricultural value chains

The African Development Bank has recently approved a loan of 73.2 million euros for the Republic of Congo with an objective to set up agricultural value chains.

The idea of setting up agricultural value chains is ensured to benefit over 350,000 people. The Integrated Agricultural Value Chain Development Project in Congo (PROVIDAC), which will be implemented for six years, must cover the corridors of the major marketing centers of Brazzaville and Pointe Noire as well as the production basins in the Plateaux departments, Pool, Bouenza, Cuvette and Niari.

"The project will focus on a limited number of value chains, including cassava (flour and other products), poultry (broilers and eggs), maize (animal feed, human and brewery), aquaculture and fish farming (fresh fish and salted fish, smoked)," said Ali Eyeghe, head of the Agriculture, Human and Social Development for Central Africa Division (RDGC2) at the African Development Bank.

"Some 355,000 people, 40 percent of whom are women and 40 percent of whom are young people in the various links of the targeted agricultural value chains, are concerned by the interventions of PROVIDAC," Ali Eyeghe added.

In addition to supporting women's economic empowerment, entrepreneurship and skills development for young people, the project is expected to contribute to the establishment of a suitable agricultural financing mechanism. It will thus improve agricultural productivity over the long term thanks to access to factors of production (improved and resilient inputs, machinery, plowing, capital, land), the management of soil fertility and the improvement of rural infrastructures, especially for opening up basins.

Since 1967, the African Development Bank (AfDB) has financed development operations in the Republic of Congo for USD 487 million. Apart from the study of the agricultural sector conducted in 2012, the Bank's investments in Congo in the agricultural sector date back more than 20 years.