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The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has
committed loan assistance to the Philippines over a five-year period
to finance projects that would help ease the poverty situation in
the rural areas, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA)
said.
The NEDA said IFAD’s loan assistance is
between $56 million and $61million from 2008 to 2012. The loan has
0.75-percent service charge with no interest rate payable in 40
years and a grace period of 10 years.
The IFAD assistance will fund projects that
would ensure poor rural people better access to water and land;
improved technologies and services, financial services as well as
off-farm employment and enterprise development, among others.
Projects that have been funded by IFAD include
the Western Mindanao Community Initiatives project, which aims for
higher incomes above poverty threshold, better standards of living
and greater livelihood resilience for some 16,000 households in
selected areas of Western Mindanao through increased subsistence,
cash crop and fishery production.
-- Darwin G. Amojelar
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