Incentives Driving Economic Alternatives for the North, East, West (IDEA-NEW)

Incentives Driving Economic Alternatives – North, East, West (IDEA-NEW) is a USAID project that began in March 2009, and is scheduled to be completed in March 2014. This project continues USAID’s efforts to provide agricultural incentives and economic alternatives for provinces in the East as well as the northern and western poppy-prone regions of the country.

 

USAID is supporting agriculture marketing, developing rural enterprise and infrastructure, managing watersheds, accessing finance and building national value-chains and trade for key regional products. USAID collaborates with national, provincial, and district-level officers of line ministries, as well as provincial governors and local leaders. USAID works closely with provincial reconstruction teams to coordinate and target activities, particularly in areas of USAID priority engagement. The objective of the IDEA-NEW program is intensive value chain development leading to increased incomes and employment in the agricultural sector. IDEA-NEW’s interventions boost agricultural productivity, thereby increasing incomes, jobs and stability in rural areas, including strategic Key Terrain Districts (KTD) and poppy-prone areas. Value chain development to increase licit incomes in poppy-prone areas is the priority for IDEA-NEW through the transition to 2014. IDEA-NEW local procurement practices support USAID’s Afghan First Policy by prioritizing local procurement and staffing, and working through line departments and private Afghan agribusiness firms. [[nid:49931]]