Relevant Models For CIS Republics

Zvi Herman, the recently appointed director of CINADCO, the agricultural arm of MASHAV, sees his organization's involvement in the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) deepening. Moreover, the new modalities of professional and technical support units that have been established to encourage agribusiness entrepreneurship in Kazakhstan, Kyrgysztan and Georgia, and which make broad use of information, knowhow and technology, are new CINADCO models which can also be applied to other parts of Asia as well as Africa and Latin America.

"One of the first actions I took on assuming the directorship of CINADCO," explained Zvi Herman, "was to put the organization on-line by introducing Internet (the worldwide computer linkup) and e-mail throughout CINADCO."

That said, Herman stressed that one of CINADCO's strengths has always been the ability to absorb new technologies and professional know how and adapt them to the needs of a hungry world, while confronting dynamic situations in an ever-changing world.

Zvi Herman has experienced agriculture from every possible angle. He grew up on the farming cooperative (moshav) of Nir Israel near Ashkelon in south central Israel. He studied agronomy at the Hebrew University's Faculty of Agriculture and served as managing secretary of his moshav settlement and in various executive capacities for regional farming associations before becoming a regional planner in the south for the Jewish Agency and Ministry of Agriculture. From 1982 onwards he spent five years in the Pacific region as a MASHAV agricultural and cooperative consultant in Fiji and the Pacific.

He joined CINADCO in 1987 as a project planner and rose through the ranks to become assistant to the director and deputy director in 1995. He also served as managing director of Agridev, the government's only commercial company for agricultural development projects in developing countries. He took time out in 1992/93 to conduct MA studies at Clarke University in Massachusetts in the US. He has travelled widely in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean for CINADCO, but since 1993 he has been most often to the former Soviet Union.

"It was only natural," said Herman, "that CINADCO should cooperate with the newly-independent republics of the former Soviet Union, particularly those to the south of Russia. The arid and many other conditions are similar to Israel, and CINADCO has an excellent Russian-speaking capability."

Following the break-up of the Soviet Union, CINADCO together with MASHAV and USAID devised a comprehensive package in cooperation related to the agricultural sector with Georgia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tadjikistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgysztan to support the transition from the highly centralized, command economy to a market driven economy.

"Many problems had to be tackled," noted Herman. "Land and water resources had to be re-allocated and human resources had to be re-trained. Many countries were agricultural mono-cultures. In Uzbekistan, for example, cotton is dominant. New technology and modern management practices had to be introduced and marketing became an issue. Under the Communist regime there was always a market for produce. Now farmers have to worry about finding a market."

In the first phase CINADCO began doing what it has always done well. From 1993 onwards about 250 professionals per year in middle and upper management positions have come to Israel for courses. On-the-spot courses of a week or two in duration have been held in the CIS Republics focusing on topics which are most relevant to the region such as dairy husbandry, crop diversification and the introduction of high value- added crops, irrigation, water and farm management and post-harvest care. Experts were sent on short-term consultancies to advise on these matters and demonstration farm activities were set up in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgysztan, and are in the process of being set up in Turmenistan and Georgia.

"The demonstration farms," he said, "are inserted into former kolkhoz and sovkhoz collectives and show local people under real conditions what can be achieved. The people we see are highly educated and mostly very open to taking up new methods and technologies such as computerization, irrigation methods and dairy management. They understand the importance of change."

With this in mind MASHAV, CINADCO and USAID have begun the second phase of their project in Russian-speaking Asia and southeast Europe, which focus on assisting small and medium, newly formed family farms now that most of the large collectives have been broken up.

"We have started setting up Agribusiness Entrepreneurship Support Units," he said, "usually in existing training and farmers' institutions that assist and cater for the growing demand for field level professional extension and related business advisory services."

The units' main functions include: preparation of business plans; professional extension in horticulture and high-value crops; animal husbandry; agricultural and business production economics; marketing and general business services. Local farmers and managers can link up to the Internet, view training videos and compile business plans.

Haim Divon, Deputy Director General of the Foreign Ministry and Head of MASHAV, travelled with Zvi Herman to the CIS region last November to evaluate MASHAV's extensive activities in the area and the relevance of these activities to the socioeconomic processes that the region is undergoing. In addition they officially opened the first two support units in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgysztan, and in Kazakhstan 40 kilometres from the capital Alma Ati. A third such unit has been opened in Tbilisi, Georgia, in the headquarters of the Farmers' Union. Similar units will open soon in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The units are best managed by a suitable local professional.

"These professional and technical support units may well be suitable with some adaptation to other parts of the world," stressed Zvi Herman, "and with the globalization process and information technology CINADCO and its partners on every continent can now exchange information over the Internet. Today's vision of agricultural technical cooperation is to better understand the ever-changing conditions of the rural setting and to be at all times relevant to these needs and new challenges."