In close collaboration with Dutch Committee for Afghanistan, other US government programs and Provincial Department of Agriculture, USAID’s IDEA-NEW conducted a month-long livestock de-worming campaign benefiting 25,000 farming families in 14 districts of Faryab province.
The campaign was implemented by 30 local paravets trained two years ago by USAID’s ASAP project. Through the initiative, around 273, 000 animals were de-wormed against common parasitic diseases that affect livestock during winter.
IDEA-NEW provided 500 Afghanis for each paravet for 30 days, sent monitors for oversight and paid for 14,000 fliers promoting extension messages for grazing and raising animals. Dutch Committee and other US government programs covered costs of medicine for de-worming and helped in monitoring the campaign.
The main purpose behind the de-worming campaign was to eliminate intestinal parasites, which are taken by animals through grazing fresh fodder, and to restore their appetite for eating winter fodder. “It’s a great pleasure for us that our animals are given medicine for microbes that weaken and kill them every winter. Hope most of our animals stay alive and fat after this campaign,” said Ibrahim, a farmer in Bilchiragh district of Faryab.
The district governments and the Community Development Councils facilitated bringing people together to have their animals de-wormed during the campaign. Services provided during this campaign were free of charge, but in order to ensure farmers who really looked for such assistance were selected, farmers had to pay one Afghani for a goat or sheep and five Afghanis for a cow or bull to be de-wormed, to the cashier of their village CDC.
The CDCs were able to raise 277,500 Afghanis
from medicine administered to the livestock across the province. The villages
will use this money for procuring additional livestock services.
Raising livestock is the main source of income for most of the inhabitants of Faryab. There is a pressing demand of such campaigns to cover more animals, enabling them to survive and bring farmers higher revenues. This will also respond to the growing need of meats in major cities as Mazar-e-Sharif, Pule khomri, Kabul and others throughout northern and central Afghanistan, and will help in lowering dependence on meat imports.
RTA coverage on IDEA-NEW agricultural activities in Laghman province (1 of 2)
RTA coverage on IDEA-NEW agricultural activities in Laghman province (2 of 2)
Salar Canal (Barya Program) Part 3 of 4
March/April 2013