The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the Cambodian Agriculture Cooperative Corporation (CACC) have launched a new project targeting over 1,200 smallholder farmers and their extended families in Mondulkiri province’s Koh Nhek district.

The project aims to enhance the resilience and livelihoods of smallholder farmers through organic agriculture and access to markets. It also seeks to promote improved nutrition and gender equality through social behavioural change approaches designed to generate demand for healthy diets and tackle harmful social norms.

The project is funded by the Global Agriculture and Food Security Programme and CACC at $1.79 million and $1.1 million respectively.

“The project was designed in the COVID-19 context and adopted an innovative public-private-producer partnership approach, underscoring the need to leverage private-sector investment, strengthen policy dialogue, secure the necessary know-how and support more environmentally sound, socially equitable and economically viable development,” said Claire Conan, WFP Representative in Cambodia.

CACC will build an inclusive and integrated organic food value chain and incentivise smallholder farmers, including women and the indigenous population, to switch to organic farming using only natural fertilisers and pesticides, coupled with other climate-smart practices.

Kunthy Kann, CACC managing director, said the prices of organic food are higher and more stable than traditional commodities, creating opportunities for higher profit margins and steadier sources of income.

He noted that smallholder farmers of Mondulkiri province tend to restrict their cultivation to rice, employing largely traditional rotation farming practices that make their yields vulnerable to climate change and other types of shocks.

“Our goal is to increase the participating farmers’ incomes by up to 20%, compared to typical farm gate returns,” Kann added, illustrating that CACC will facilitate market linkages to ensure this, and the farmers will be able to use the premiums earned to better safeguard against future shocks and stresses.

According to Conan the increasing income will play an important role in facilitating better nutrition as households can access more diverse and healthy food and avoid the negative impacts of shock-induced damages on their household nutrition.

Conan noted that that the connections between livelihood and nutrition are of particular significance given the high levels of poverty and malnutrition in the targeted area.

“To tackle the issues, the project will deploy social behavioural change communication to influence food behaviour and gender equality in households,” said Conan, adding that to engage women in the project is a key transforming factor because in Cambodia, women play a lead role in households’ food management and make up over half of the agricultural labour force despite facing many difficulties in terms of access to land, extension services, financial services, market and technology.