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UKRAINE  SUPPORT FOR THE CREATION OF  THREE NEW PRIVATE FARM SUPPORT CENTRES  9 Suvorova St, room 111, Kiev Tel/Fax 044 4514456 E-mail noelmcco@i.kiev.ua

Contractor: TDI and ADAS in association with National University of Ireland Dublin and Teagasc
Recipient : Ministry of Agricultural Policy on behalf of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine

Project Outline, Achievements to Date and Further Activities Planned

Commencement Date in Ukraine: 22 January 2001

Duration: 2 ½ years

Outputs Proposed 

1. Sustainable Private Farm Support Centres (PFSCs) in each of the three oblasts Chernihiv, Luhansk and Mykolayev for providing paid services to private farms and relevant agri-industry enterprises.

2. Establishment of nine rayon Regional Offices linked to the PFSCs (three each).

3. An independent, sustainable National Coordination and Training Centre (NCTC) in Kiev as a main coordination & development body of a national network of private farm support centres and agricultural extension services.

4. Fifteen experts for the PFSCs (five each), eighteen Regional Office experts (two per Regional Office) and three NCTC full-time and circa ten part-time experts trained.

5. Marketing and other agri-industry operations are strengthened through linkages with primary producers and improved enterprise management; agri-industry participates in the agricultural knowledge system with research, extension and education bodies.

Achievements to Date and Further Activities Planned

The three PFSCs are fully operational and are registered as legal entities. They in turn are in process of establishing the rayon ROs, three each. In combination with their ROs each PFSC has from 60 to 120 regular clients of which an average of 47 per PFSC have so far paid for consultancy services. Average payment per client is approximately Hrv 40 and ranges from Hrv 5 to 350. Approximately 40% of farm clients are individual / family farms, 35% large reformed farms and 25% household plot owners. The PFSCs also have a small number of non-farm / agri-industry clients and are active in supporting the establishment of small rural non-farm businesses.

Field days and seminars for farms are regularly organised. During the winter period a total of 24 farm business management 30-hour courses for farms will be delivered, 18 of which will be in the rayon ROs. The target will be to train a minimum of 12 farm owners / managers per course, a total of almost three hundred, one hundred per oblast.

Sustainability of the PFSCs and their associated rayon ROs will require some oblast / state funding in addition to fees earned from clients.

The National Coordination and Training Centre (NCTC) is located in the presidium building of the Academy of Agrarian Science in central Kiev. It combines training and support for the three PFSCs with the development of a capacity to support the wider network of extension services. It has used ten experts from the most relevant extension-type organisations (especially donor supported ones) in the provision of its training programme for the three PFSCs, thereby creating a corps of part-time trainers / experts able to provide relevant courses for existing and future new members of the network and to assist in other NCTC activities.

NCTC proposes to become the headquarters, executive body and development unit of a legally registered association of farm support centres and agricultural / rural extension service experts. In addition to providing services to such organisations it will strive to expand their number by assisting the establishment and / or further development of extension services in approximately 15 of the 25 oblasts where there are currently none or they are not well developed. 

NCTC will strive to become self-sustaining by the end of the Tacis Project in May 2003. It will derive some income from membership fees paid by the farm support centres and extension services, enhancing the value of such membership by providing a website of extension materials and information and a range of staff / programme development services. It will strive to obtain, directly or through the relevant oblasts, state funding for assisting the start-up of extension services and will cooperate with government in striving to attract donors to support this activity. NCTC will also offer services to agri-industry including the option to advertise on its website. 

Experts 

Financial 

Tacis Project budget is Euro 2.5 million of which 0.5 million is for equipment.

Annual post-project cost of the PFSCs is estimated to be in the range Hrv 130,000 (Euro 25,000) to Hrv 190,000 (Euro 37,000) per PFSC according to their respective business plans.

Annual post-project cost of NCTC is estimated to be Hrv 324,000 (Euro 63,000).

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