Background of the Project

Starting in the late 1960s, the Green Revolution introduced unprecedented technological and economic transformation and growth in Pakistan’s agriculture sector; however, that growth has steadily declined for the past two decades, and agriculture has reached a point of diminishing marginal returns from the technologies and resources at its disposal. More recently, agriculture’s contribution to Pakistan’s GDP has declined; however, it still accounts for 21.6 per cent of value added; 64 per cent of the population still lives in rural areas and 45 per cent of the nation’s labour force still work in agriculture. The top agriculture producing provinces in Pakistan are Punjab and Sindh, which account for 81 per cent of agriculture GDP. Sindh Province has 23.8 per cent of Pakistan’s population, 18 per cent of its land area, and 14 per cent of its total cropped area. Sindh agriculture is characterized by large landowners, dominating production of the four major crops—rice, wheat, sugar cane, and cotton; which are heavily regulated and receive extensive government subsidies through price support structures, that usually do not benefit the smallholder farming community. About 30-35 per cent of Sindh’s population lives below poverty line, and a majority of the poor are rural.

In addition, in July 2011, the 18th Amendment of Pakistan’s Constitution introduced devolution of many government services, including agriculture, to the provinces. The Government of Pakistan (GoPak) and Government of Sindh (GoSindh) have both highlighted commercial agriculture and market linkages as priority investments for the sector. GoSindh has also prioritized investments in support of small and medium farmers and in value chains that will positively impact women, therefore, targeting horticulture, which is largely unregulated even as it includes more private sector actors than the major crops, but has received little donor attention except for mangoes and bananas. Thus this project, the Sindh Agricultural Growth Project (SAGP) will focus on horticulture—particularly chilies (92 per cent of national production), onions (33 per cent), and dates (about 50 per cent)—and milk production because they have a small farmer focus, have significant involvement of women in production and processing, and, from a national perspective, Sindh enjoys the greatest competitive advantage and has a high unmet production potential. These will be addressed in the pro-poor production value chains, with participation of the private sector whenever and wherever feasible in the project areas. The major constraints identified in the analysis of the targeted value chains is the quality of production and the high level of post-harvest losses of up to 25% between farm and the consumer for horticultural crops and of about 30% in case of milk.

It is also described that the Government of Pakistan/Government of Sindh (GoPak/GoSindh) has requested the International Development Association (IDA) for a Credit of US$ 76.4 million to finance the cost of proposed Sindh Agricultural Development Project (SAGP) for increasing agricultural competitiveness and expanding rural livelihoods through this multi-departmental intervention involving two departments: Agriculture and Livestock and Fisheries.

Description of the SAGP

Project development objectives (PDO). The proposed Project Development Objective (PDO) is to improve the productivity and market access of small and medium producers in important commodity value chains. This will be achieved by:

1. investing in knowledge and technology for producers, sub-sectors of crops and livestock; and
2. strengthening public sector institutions to enhance the enabling environment for sustained sectoral growth.

Project Components. The SAGP would contribute to more inclusive growth by prioritizing support to small producers with commercial potential. The project would be implemented over a period of five years and would have the following components:

Component A: Capacity Building and Institutional Development:

• Sub-component A.1: Capacity Building of Producers.
• Sub-component A.2: Modernization of Extension Services and Agricultural Research. This subcomponent will finance:
  1. Technical assistance to the implementing departments;
  2. Modernization of extension services and facilities; and
  3. Competitive fund for adaptive research.
• Sub-component A.3: Strategic Planning for the Agricultural Sector: The project will finance the:
  1. Development of Sindh Agricultural Development Strategy; and
  2. Preparation of feasibility studies for future investments.

Component B: Investment for Agricultural Growth:

• Sub-component B.1: Horticulture Value Chains. The project will finance investments in three (3) horticulture crops – dates, onions and chilies. The key focus will remain on adopting good agricultural practices for production and post-harvest handling of the selected crops.
• Sub-component B.2: Rice Post-harvest Loss Management.
• Sub-component B.3: Dairy Value Chain.
• Sub-component B.4: Demand Driven Innovation Fund.

Component C: Project Management and Monitoring and Evaluation. This component would finance costs for:

1. Project Management Units (PMUs), Project Coordinator’s Unit (PCU) and Project Implementation Units (PIUs);
2. Third Party Monitoring;
3. Implementation of Environment and Social Management Framework (ESMF) and Pest Management Plan (PMP) and development of Social Assessment; and
4. Rigorous Impact Evaluation to attribute causality to project interventions. The operational costs would also include costs financing of communications strategy and awareness campaigns through print and electronic media; grievance redressal mechanism (GRM) including interactive voice response and complaint tracking system; and management information system (MIS).

Project Implementation: The project will be implemented by the GoSindh over a period of five years starting from January 2014. The primary implementing agencies are Departments of Agriculture, and Livestock and Fisheries. Each of the two departments will administer SAGP through a Project Monitoring Units (PMUs) at the departmental levels, while the overall coordination will be through the Project Coordination Unit (PCU) housed in the Planning and Development Department, for monitoring and evaluating all aspect of the SAGP (Component C).

Project Beneficiaries

As per the project documents, the proposed project will contribute to more inclusive growth by prioritizing support to small and medium sized producers who are trying to compete in horticulture markets. The project will reach to approximately 112,000 farmers covering over 66,000 ha. A substantive number of these farmers would be women involved in the agricultural processes on-farm for pre-and post- harvest practices for the selected commodities.

The project will use a value chain approach to provide direct investment support to the farmers and producers groups for:

1. development of more effective and efficient farming systems;
2. introduction of technology packages for increased productivity and value addition, and;
3. improved market access.

These services will be made available with a defined focus on how they reach the women in agriculture. The project will be provincial in scope but specific activities may be concentrated geographically based on agro-ecological conditions or natural clustering of economic activities. It is expected that beneficiaries will be able to establish effective and efficient production systems and create market linkages.

The table describes the project beneficiaries for different crops and livestock and formation of groups:

S#	Crop/ Milk	District	No. of Tehsils	No. of Beneficiaries	No. of Farmer / Milk Producing Groups	No. of Acres/ Animals
1	Chillies	3	9	31,020	2068	17510
2	Dates	2	10	7,980	532	3990
3	Onion	11	36	33,360	2224	20823
4	Rice	8	33	40,000	2667	27266
5	Milk	10	45	6,120	153	30,600 (animals)
Total				118,480	7,644

The project provides services to the agricultural growers and milk producers in targeted areas of Sindh province of Pakistan as described in the following chart:

Chart I: Overall Institutional Arrangements

The institutional and implementation arrangements are shown in the following flow chart:

S.No.	Implementation Talukas	Target Farmers (number)	Targeted Acres (number)
Chilies	Mirpurkhas
1	Mirpurkhas	11,750	5,875
2	Digri
3	Jhudo
4	KGM
	Umerkot
5	Umerkot	12,000	8,000
6	Kunri
7	Samaro
	Badin
8	Talhar	7,270	3,635
9	Matli
	CHILIES TOTAL	31,020	17,510
Onions	Ghotki
10	Ghotki	3,336	1,668
11	Khangarh
12	MirpurMathelo
13	Ubauro
14	Daharki
	NausherhroFeroze
15	Kandioro	2,988	1,494
16	NausheroFeroze
17	Bhiria
18	Moro
	Nawabshah
19	Nawabshah	2,900	1,100
20	Sakrand
	Shikarpur
21	Shikarpur	2,200	1,100
22	Khanpur
23	GarhiYasin
24	Lakhi
	Sanghar
25	Sanghar	4,500	2,250
26	Sinjhoro
27	Jam Nawaz Ali
28	Shahdadpur
29	Tando Adam
30	Sindhri
31	Khipro
	MirpurKhas
32	Mirpurkhas	3,336	1,668
33	Digri
34	Jhudo
35	KGM
	Hyderabad & TandoAllahyar
36	Hyderabad Rural	4,500	2,250
37	TandoAllahyar
38	Chamber
39	Jhando Mari
	Matiari
40	Matiari	3,600	2,925
41	Saeedabad
42	Hala
	Badin
43	Matli	3,300	3,112
44	Talhar
	Jamshoro
45	Thana Bulla Khan	2,700	2,906
	ONIONS TOTAL	33,360	20,823
Dates	Khairpur
46	Khairpur	5,000	2,500
47	Kingri
48	Sobhodero
49	Gambat
50	KotDiji
51	Mirwah
52	FaizGanj
	Sukkur
53	Sukkur	2,980	1,490
54	Rohri
55	PanoAqil
	DATES TOTAL	7,980	3,990
Rice (post-harvest)	Larkana
56	Larkana	4,500	3,000
57	Dokri
58	Ratodero
	Shikarpur
59	Shikarpur	4,600	3,067
60	GarhiYasin
61	Lakhi
	Qambar
62	Qambar	3,600	3,000
63	Shahdadkot
64	Merokhan
65	Naseerabad
66	Warah
	Jacobabad
67	Jacobabad	5,000	3,333
68	GarhiKhairo
69	Thul
	Kashmore
70	Kashmore	4,400	2,933
71	Kandhkot
	Dadu
72	Dadu	6,500	4,333
73	K.N Shah
74	Mehar
75	Juhi
	Badin
76	Badin	5,300	3,533
77	Golarchi
78	Matli
79	Talhar
80	T.Bago
	Thatta
81	Thatta	6,100	4,067
82	MirpurSakro
83	Keti Bandar
84	Ghorabari, Sujawal
85	MirpurBathoro
86	Jati
87	Shah Bandar
88	Kharo Chan
	RICE TOTAL	40,000	27,266
	GRAND TOTAL	112,360	69,589

Implementation Talukas	Target MPGs (number)	Targeted dairy animals (number)
Khairpur District
Khairpur	30	6000
Kingri
Sobhodero
Gambat
KotDiji
Mirwah
FaizGanj
Nara
Nausheroferoze District
Kandioro	25	5000
NaushahroFeroze
Bhiria
Moro
Mehrabpur
Hyderabad District
Hyderabad City	6	1200
Latifabad
Hyderabad Rural
Qasimabad
Thatta District
Thatta	12	2400
MirpurSakro
KetiBunder
Ghorabari
Sujawal
MirpurBathoro
Jati
Shah Bandar
Kharo Chan
Sukkur District
Sukkur	10	2000
Rohri
PanoAqil
Salehpat
New Sukkur
Larkana
Bakrani	20	4000
Dokri
RatoDero
Larkana
Mirpurkhas District
MirpurKhas	26	5200
Digri
KotGhulam Mohammad
Jhuddo
Sindhri
Jhando Mari
ShaheedBenazirabad District
Sakrand	24	4800
Nawab Shah
Kazi Ahmed
Daur
TOTAL	153	30,600

Source: Operation Manual, SAGP, GOS