July 23, 2007

ACDI/VOCA Hosts Cape Verde Lessons Learned Workshop

From July 16–19, ACDI/VOCA held a workshop jointly with the Cape Verde Ministry of Agriculture to present the results, impact of and lessons learned from the Cape Verde PL 480 Title II program. Implementing partners and beneficiaries discussed the successful culmination of 16 years of activity with the 86 participants, including representatives from the governments of Mauritania, Mali and Niger, and private voluntary organization participants from Burkina Faso and Niger.

Workshop participant Joseph Coulibaly of Burkina Faso said, "I was impressed by the great work your program is doing in the field....I could not have imagined that it is possible to undertake soil and water conservation activities with such geographical challenges....Prior to visiting your program, I was hesitating about the feasibility of doing drip irrigation at the farmer level, but your program convinced me that this is the best option for the Sahelian countries."

U.S. Ambassador Roger Pierce, Cape Verde Minister of Agriculture Magdalena Neves and ACDI/VOCA-Cape Verde Chief of Party Bick Riley gave opening remarks, and Riley had interviews on two national radio stations and one TV station. The workshop was also featured on A Semana and O Liberal, Cape Verdean online newspapers.