wfn.org | ADRA Awarded Largest Australian Grant

["Christian B. Schäffler" <APD_Info_Schweiz@compuserve.com>]

January 2, 2000
Adventist Press Service (APD)
Christian B. Schaeffler, Editor-in-chief
Fax +41-61-261 61 18
APD@stanet.ch
http://www.stanet.ch/APD
CH-4003 Basel, Switzerland

Adventist Development and Relief Agency Awarded Largest 
Australian Grant 

Wahroonga, Australia.    The Australian government recently 
awarded the Adventist Development and Relief Agency 
(ADRA) with nearly US$1.5 million for a three-year Food 
Security/Cashew Reforestation Project in Mozambique. The 
purpose of the project is to increase food security within the 
households of 6,400 families (more than 38,400 residents) in 
the Pebane District.

Honorable Kathy Sullivan, parliamentary secretary to the 
Minister of Foreign Affairs in Australia, notified ADRA Australia 
staff of the approved funding in a recent letter. Addressed to 
David Syme, ADRA's regional director for programs in the 
South Pacific region, she wrote, "The Australia Government 
recognizes the important role that Australian NGOs play within 
the aid program and remains strongly committed to effective 
cooperation with the NGO community." 

"The project, administered under the guidance of more than 
100 staff, is highly specific and unique to the country of 
Mozambique," explains Curtis Hesse, ADRA Mozambique 
country director. "It aims to reforest more than 250,000 
genetically improved grafted varieties of cashew trees, 
produced within the 64 community nurseries and central 
nursery, in addition to rehabilitating the existing cashew 
population under the family sector, directly involving 6,400 
small holders." 

The reforestation of cashew trees is expected to enhance the 
income of small holders and food access through increased 
crop yields. According to Hesse, small holder beneficiaries are 
chosen on the basis of ownership of and willingness to clear at 
least one half hectare of land to be reforested with 40 grafted 
cashew seedlings; prior cashew production knowledge; and a 
willingness to maintain a community nursery which will serve 
as a plant production site and selling point in the future.

"This is the largest single grant from the Australian 
government in the history of the agency," Syme says. "It 
reflects the professionalism and financial integrity of the 
agency and the fact that the Australian government 
recognizes the growing and sterling support that our 
constituency are giving to enable us to deliver quality 
assistance." ADRA submitted one of 15 proposals from 10 
different Australian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). 

Warren Scale, director for programs at ADRA Australia, 
expressed his delight at the good news. "At a time when 
much of our energy is absorbed with disasters, it is really 
encouraging to receive such a grant. Development programs 
must be our priority because they help to make the poor less 
vulnerable when disaster does strike," he said. "Not only will 
this project help restore the environment badly damaged 
during years of civil war in Mozambique, but it will provide an 
important food source to the local people for their own 
consumption as well as family income from the sale of surplus 
production."

ADRA has implemented similar programs elsewhere in 
Mozambique, and also in northern Ghana where more than 10 
million trees were planted in the last nine years. To find out 
more about ADRA's international programs visit the web site 
at www.adra.org.