Ethiopian Cooperatives Fight Food Insecurity with Business Investments
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Opening of the new Selale Dairy Producers Cooperative Union feed mill by General Manager Ato Yaregal Aysheshum and USDA Agriculture Counselor Merritt Chesley. |
Ethiopia has long fought the twin challenges of hunger and food insecurity. An active participant in this fight, ACDI/VOCA partnered in 2010 with the Selale Dairy Producers Cooperative Union to make investments in local agricultural production to fill market gaps and improve local food quality and availability.
Already, this partnership has yielded fruit: ACDI/VOCA and the union—comprising 27 cooperative associations with members from 2,000 households—inaugurated a major animal feed processing plant and also laid the cornerstone for a dairy processing plant.
"The equipment that the union is using will produce up to 2,000 metric tons of feed per year," says ACDI/VOCA's John "Bick" Riley at the feed mill launch. "It is a good beginning. Through the use of this feed, members of the union will have safe feed, with a significant reduction of nutritional problems as well as diseases and contamination." More.
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ACDI/VOCA's Capabilities Brochure
ACDI/VOCA has worked in 145 nations since 1963 to provide knowledge, opportunities and choices. Learn about what distinguishes ACDI/VOCA and our signature approach to international development. (PDF, 966 KB) |
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A Smart Gender Approach Strengthens Food Security
 ACDI/VOCA gender specialist Lindsey Jones addressed development practitioners on April 22 in a panel discussion on "The Hidden Role of Gender in Food Security and Value Chain Development" at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.
Jones said that understanding and addressing gender roles in value chains can both strengthen the targeted value chains and empower women.
ACDI/VOCA's approach to development is to look for opportunities to strengthen the position of women, especially at the smallholder farmer level, while mitigating the adverse effects that such interventions can have on women.
Jones illustrated this point with examples from programs working with smallholder farmers in Kenya and India. More.
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Photo Essay: Haiti's REACH Students Build Sturdy Classrooms
 Construction students trained in seismic- and hurricane-resistant building techniques with support from ACDI/VOCA's REACH program are nearing the end of their final project: the construction of two primary school classrooms in Haiti's Southeast Department.
"The students' theoretical sessions are essentially completed. Final sessions were conducted by the Southeast Department public work's regional director on Haiti's construction standards," says Deputy Chief of Party Mathieu Lucius. "The regional director has been very impressed with the quality of training provided to the REACH students." More.
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Liberian Farmers' Savings and Loan Club Marks One-Year Milestone  Liberian cocoa farmers who are members of the Kwadeador Savings and Loan Club recently marked a milestone: one year of successful operation with all of its original members intact.
"This money club that ACDI/VOCA introduced to us has really proven to us that we can manage our own loan clubs with no problems at the end of the cycle, where we share our money with no signs of cheating, compared with previous money clubs in our town," says member Lucy Yahnplu.
The savings club, based in Nimba County, is part of the Kwakerseh Farmers' Association, which receives technical assistance from ACDI/VOCA's USAID-funded Livelihood Improvement for Farming Enterprises (LIFE) project. More.
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ACDI/VOCA E-Learning Program Garners Laurels Vast distances and time differences can make it difficult to train 1,500 employees spread across 40 countries. But as ACDI/VOCA has learned, e-learning tools help overcome those barriers. In recognition of our achievement, Learning In NGOs (LINGOs) recently named ACDI/VOCA a finalist in the 2011 Global Giveback competition for its innovative use of e-learning. More.
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Best Coffee Named in Colombia's Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta  Elias Enrique Eguisa Sanjuán's entry won the honor of "Best Coffee of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta" at a competition organized by the National Federation of Coffee Growers of Colombia on May 6.
The competition, supported by ACDI/VOCA's USAID Specialty Coffee Program and Colombia's Presidential Agency for Social Action and International Cooperation (Acción Social), included more than 50 producers of high-quality Arabica coffees from Colombia's departments of Guajira, Magdalena and Cesar.
"This initiative not only shows the important capability of the Federation and departmental committees to support thousands of families, but our ability to partner with national and international coffee growers in Colombia," says Luis Genaro Muñoz Ortega, the National Federation's general manager. More.
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Philippine Cocoa Exports Up Sixfold Cocoa exports increased sixfold from 151 MT in 2008 to 1,113 MT in 2009, according to the Philippines Bureau of Customs. The trend is consistent with organized efforts to develop the country's cocoa industry, including those implemented by ACDI/VOCA, as well as steady world market demand and overall price increases over the last decade.
"The increase in the export volume of cocoa-based products from the region as compared to the previous years has been very impressive," says Mary Ann P. De Guzman, acting chief of the bureau's export division. More.
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