The World Bank has approved an International Development Association (IDA) credit of US$30M to Madagascar to establish a viable basis for irrigated agriculture and natural resources management in four main irrigation sites and their surrounding watersheds.
The Irrigation and Watershed Management project is the first phase of a three-phase, 12 year Adaptable Program Lending (APL) which will provide the Government of Madagascar with the necessary flexibility to implement the programme in accordance with preferences and capacities of users.
The project is part of a Government initiated National Irrigation and Watershed Management Programme. In addition to IDA, the programme is supported by a number of donors, including the African Development Bank (AfDB), the French Development Agency (AFD) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
The project will be implemented through four components: Development of Commercial Agriculture, Irrigation Development, Watershed Development and Programme Management. It will also lay out adequate foundations for scaling up the project’s activities on the basis of lessons learned from earlier phases.
‘With its four components, the project will support the Government of Madagascar in its objective of unleashing the potential of its important but underexploited hydraulic assets in a holistic way. In so doing, irrigated agriculture is expected to contribute to the revitalization of rural areas, to economic growth and to a real reduction of poverty,’ said IJsbrand de Jong, the World Bank Task Team Leader for the project.