Sustainable Agriculture and Natural Resource Management Programme

The objective of the programme is to improve household food security and family nutrition in an area where half of the people are poor and 30 per cent of them are extremely poor. About 70 per cent of the households in the area cannot produce enough food to satisfy their needs throughout the year, and about 60 per cent cannot produce enough to meet more than six months of their yearly requirement.

The programme targets landless people and small-scale and subsistence farmers. Almost 30 per cent of the households participating in the programme are headed by women.

To increase agricultural production and productivity, the programme supports investments in:

• agricultural diversification and intensification of crops and livestock with attention to sustainable natural resource use and management
• effective delivery of core support services that are responsive to the needs and priorities of rural households
• empowerment of local communities through the participatory community action planning process
• strengthening of the institutional capacity of the decentralized district governments as the focal points for programming, implementation, monitoring and evaluation

The programme area consists of three of Lesotho’s ten administrative districts: Mafeteng, Mohale’s Hoek and Quthing. At the central level, the main implementing agencies are the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security and the Ministry of Forestry and Land Reclamation. District offices lead the planning and implementation of field level activities. Central to the programme approach is the focus on local capacity building and the participatory planning process through community action plans.

Source: IFAD