Phase II of JICA’s Small-holder Horticulture Farmer Empowerment Project（SHEP） Kicks off in Ethiopia

After the six-year completion of the SHEP Phase I project, JICA and the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) kicked off SHEP Phase II in August 2023 in Addis Ababa. On January 29^th, Joint Coordinating Committee (JCC) was held at Addis Ababa and MoA and project team reviewed the progress of the project and discussed the issue on the project activities.

SHEP is JICA’s intervention scheme to support smallholder horticulture farmers to increase their income by changing the mindsets of farmers towards market oriented agriculture (from grow and sell to grow to sell). This approach gives farmers the tools to conduct market studies, to prepare crop calendars, to establish relationships with buyers and cooperatives and to learn techniques for improving crop yield to maximize their income.

For SHEP II, the project area in Ethiopia is expanding beyond Amhara and Oromia regions to include three new regions, Central Ethiopia, Sidama and South Ethiopia. During the projects five-year period, the Project aims to expand the SHEP Approach more effectively to government staff (comprised from the Federal, Regional, Zone, Woreda), extension officers (DAs) in kebele levels and smallholder farmers; JICA is also looking to collaborate with other organizations to scale-up the SHEP Approach.

*SHEP = Smallholder Horticulture Empowerment and Promotion