Agribusiness Development and Diversification Project (ADDP) and Livestock and Dairy Development Board (LDDB) signed an agreement here Thursday to support small farmers entering in agribusiness.
The agreement was signed by Arshad H. Hashmi, Project Director on behalf of Minfal, and Dr M. Afzal, Chief Executive Livestock and Dairy Development Board (LDDB) on behalf of the Company. About 12,500 farmers would be benefited from grant to be funded through the Agribusiness Support Fund during next 5 years. The project is sponsored by the Ministry of Food,
Agriculture and Livestock (Minfal), with the technical and financial assistance of Asian Development Bank (ADB). According to the agreement, a number of institutions will develop dedicated agribusiness finance functions, which will benefit 10,000 agro enterprises by improving access to finance, resulting in providing employment to 100,000 persons per year and 700,000 persons per year of indirect employment.
Under the capacity building activity 25,000 farmers will receive on-farm technical training while over 5,000 entrepreneurs will receive technical and managerial training.
The overall focus of the Project is on strengthening and supporting demand driven private sector service delivery mechanisms throughout the agribusiness value chain including supply inputs, production and processing, developing cool chain for domestic and export markets with specific focus on horticulture and hortibusiness.
The project also focused on livestock and dairy business. LDDB is one of the key components of the Agribusiness Development and Diversification Project.