Program areas at NCBA
Senegal - usaid feed the future kawolor:this usaid project contributes to the senegalese government's strategy in the fight against malnutrition, food insecurity and poverty. Kawolor is inspired by lessons learned from usaid's yaajeende, implemented by ncba clusa from 2010-17. the project aims to curb malnutrition by empowering organizations and regional resources partners to scale up nutrition led agriculture and use market opportunities for sustainability. the overall objective is to increase the production, consumption and marketing of safe and nutritious foods while encouraging household level consumption of diverse diets, focused primarily on women of reproductive age and children under two years of age. Ncba clusa trains and supports local institutions, such as community-based organizations, women's groups, citizen working groups, community based solution providers (cbsps) and private firms, to lead their own community development. A key platform is debbo galle groups (women's groups) that are targeted for internal savings and loans, horticulture, small enterprise development, and nutrition education. In its final years, kawolor is focused on linking activities to markets and supporting partners to develop market relationships. This focus supports building and expanding the network of cbsps, organized in independent network called cultivert. Kawolor also engages the private sector, such as firms offering solutions in improved aggregation, transportation and storage of perishable food. This program allows communities to increase consumption of nutritious and safe diets sustainably, increase on-farm availability and market supply of diverse, micro-nutrient rich foods, increase resilience and income, increase adoption of nutrition and care practices, and improve the governance of food systems. the project intervenes in 3,500 villages across 129 communes in 8 regions reaching 150,000 households, 500,000 children and 1.5 million people over five years.
Cooperative development program -creating the environment for Cooperative expansionncba clusa's 5-year (2018-2023) creating an environment for Cooperative expansion (cece) project, funded by usaid's Cooperative development program (cdp), operates in guatemala, peru, kenya, madagascar, tanzania, and ecuador to achieve 3 main goals: 1) improving enabling environments, 2) enhancing support to cooperatives, and 3) improving performance of cooperatives. To achieve these goals, activities focus on improving the legal and regulatory framework for cooperatives, building the capacity of local support institutions to provide quality Cooperative development services, and providing targeted technical assistance to more than 60 cooperatives through tailored coaching plans. To date, Cooperative law reform proposals have been developed and submitted in all 6 countries through multisectoral and participatory stakeholder engagement, with the bill in ecuador getting passed in 2023. 64 agricultural cooperatives and savings and credit cooperatives representing nearly 180,000 members have actively participated in coaching activities, with an emphasis on women's inclusion, empowerment, and leadership. From 2020-2022, improved co-op governance and financial management resulted in $40m net revenues; $8.3m increase in member equity; and over $12.6m in loans. Additionally, the cece project partners with more than 30 local Cooperative supportive organizations and other private sector partners to enhance services to cooperatives.
Dominican republic - safe agriculture/food export (safe)the safe agriculture/food export (safe) project (known locally as progana) was awarded to the National Cooperative Business Association clusa international (ncba clusa) to lead the consortium of the dominican agribusiness board (jad), Texas a&m university's borlaug institute (tamu), fundacin rural economic development (reddom) and genex Cooperative. Safe is a seven-year project being implemented in the dominican republic from september 2015 to december 2023 to strengthen the dominican beef and dairy value chains. Safe supports the dominican livestock sector by strengthening the capacity of producers, producer organizations, processors, and government institutions in 11 provinces to increase the use of good farming practices, Business development services, access to financial services, organizational capacity, best manufacturing practices, marketing, and access to markets, among other activities. the project has the following two objectives: improve productivity in the livestock (beef and dairy) value chain and expand trade of beef and dairy products. Over the past few years, ncba has provided technical assistance to support the government of the dominican republic to comply with usda fsis equivalence standards for the export of raw beef products to u.s. markets. Ncba has bolstered the capacity of beef producers and processors to comply with National and international food safety standards.ncba has implemented trainings to increase the application of good agricultural practices; animal health; nutrition and husbandry practices; haccp; bpm; sps; and industry food safety standards.