AGRICULTURE SECTOR II

The GOB"s Ministry of Agriculture and Campesino Affairs (MACA) will be the primary implementing agency for the project, which will: (1) increase the availability of agricultural inputs, particularly land and improved seed; (2) expand small farmer credit; and (3) develop the agricultural sector"s human resource and management capacities. Specific targets are to: (1) construct three new processing and storage facilities for basic crop seeds and upgrade three other facilities built under 5110455; (2) capitalize a Rotating Seed Purchase Fund for small farmers, to be managed by MACA, and provide related training to MACA technicians and TA to the National Seed Program; (3) extend the geographical coverage of the Bolivian Agricultural Bank"s Small Farmer Credit Program to include the present project"s target areas, establish a special line of credit for land clearing activities under the aegis of the Tarija Departmental Development Committee (CODETAR), and extend production and investment credit to 5,000 farmers, as well as credit to 2,200 farmers for the clearing of 10,000 ha of land in Tarija"s Humid Chaco area; (4) upgrade the agriculture sector"s human resource capabilities by providing U.S. or third-country M.S. training in agriculture to 12 faculty members at the Universidad Mayor de San Simon in Cochabamba and the Universidad Mayor Gabriel Rene Moreno in Santa Cruz, improving library and laboratory/experimental farm facilities at the universities, and constructing a National Entomology Laboratory in Cochabamba; and (5) improve sector management and coordination by financing long-term TA to MACA in management skills (sector planning, data management, administrative systems, and budgeting), further development of the area sample frame initiated under 5110455, short- and long-term training for about 38 MACA personnel, and construction of two new agricultural service centers in the Departments of Potosi and Tarija. The project will be financed largely through a loan. However, long-term TA will be funded under complementary project 5110481.