ACSAD organization supports youth empowerment.
Dr. Nasr Edin Obeid, the Director-General of the Arab Center for the Studies of Arid Zones and Drylands (ACSAD), confirmed that the Organization is continually coordinating and following up its work in the Syrian Arab Republic, the headquarters country in cooperation with the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform. He has expressed ACSAD’s welcoming the collaboration with (National youth empowerment project) through the protocol of cooperation between the two sides with all relevant stakeholders.
During his meeting with Engineer Mustafa Abbasi, the head of the project team, on 21/12/2020, in Damascus at the Organization’s headquarters. Dr. Obaid clarified that ACSAD had been one of the leading and initiative organizations since 2014 in implementing the development and relief projects that alleviate Syria’s crisis and its repercussions on the most affected rural population, especially the rural youth generation. These projects continued by ACSAD with the upgrading of training and follow-up to improve Syrian families’ livelihoods. He added that ACSAD had been achieved in cooperation with the Spanish Organization Action Against Hunger (AAH-Spain), completed 18 developmental and relief projects in Syria, and one project in the Arab Republic of Egypt total value exceeding US$ 10.5 million in recent years.
Dr. Nasr Edin Obaid noted that these projects targeted 50 thousand rural families affected by the crisis in Syria, including 20 thousand rural women in various rural areas of Syrian governorates, by giving them a complete package of essential agricultural inputs, which is equivalent to 13347 baskets of crop seeds and vegetable seedlings, 7000 tons of concentrated forage, 4282 of veterinary bags; to ensure that they won’t emerge from the productive process and return them back to both the plant and animal parts of the agricultural production cycle, stabilizing them in their villages through improving food security and diversity and achieving self-sufficiency. To continue providing technical and training support to reach outputs in production and productivity at the optimal value of additional income generation and provide appropriate job opportunities for their conditions and their link to local markets, overall, achieving comprehensive rural development drives the rural agriculture productive economy.
The Director-General pointed out that 144 rain-water harvesting units had been implemented at the household and community level and implemented about 1,400 extension forums targeting 13,800 farmers to increase expertise and skill in plant and animal agricultural practices. More than 2,000 young men and women have been trained in the manufacture of homemade plant and animal products and have been supported free of charge with full baskets of equipment and tools to begin to secure a suitable job opportunity and achieve a suitable earning return for rural families and young people in the countryside.
For his part, the head of the national youth empowerment project team in Syria, Engineer Mustafa Abbasi, expressed his profound thanks to the Arab Center Organization (ACSAD) and its Director-General Dr. Nasr Edin Obaid, for their great interest in combating poverty, empowering needy families and supporting young people in productive projects that contribute to improving livelihoods. He also noted ACSAD highly respected reputation in all its areas of work.
