KIRUNDO June 19th (ABP) – The Institutional and Operational Support Program for the Agricultural Sector in Burundi (PAIOSA) organized, on Friday June 15, 2023, at the headquarters of Kirundo province (north of Burundi), a meeting for the presentation of the achievements of that program. The meeting also aimed to hand over those achievements to the administration and technical services of the provincial Bureau for the environment, agriculture and livestock (BPEAE).
PAIOSA, which spent 11 years in that province, focused on the intensification of agriculture in the communes of Kirundo, Ntega, Busoni and Bugabira.
The head of office, Mr. Bernard Bizoza, said that they trained a lot of farmers on agricultural techniques to intensify the growing of banana, maize, beans, rice, etc., as well as on the revaluation of drainage basins. The other objective was to ensure that the neighbors of the beneficiaries could adopt those agricultural techniques, the beneficiaries of the program having been recommended to popularize these techniques learned among their neighbors. Mr. Bizoza did not fail to point out that this program has also shown the beneficiaries the importance of pooling their properties for bloc crops, so that they can practice those techniques at the same time and easily benefit from agricultural inputs.
Program beneficiaries have testified that the PAIOSA program has instilled in them knowledge that has enabled them to increase production. One of them testified that he harvests 80 kilograms of beans, but after learning those techniques, he is able to produce 250 kilograms in the same property. The other who invested in the growing of banana trees on 5 hectares indicated that he now has a monthly income of around one million, and that he benefited from a banana processing unit for making drinks.
The governor’s adviser in charge of development, Mrs. Virginie Cimpaye, commended the achievements of the PAIOSA program and recommended that the beneficiaries of the program popularize the techniques learned among their friends and neighbors, even in other communes, in order to face up to famine and poverty, while passing to the vision of the government, of the emerging country in 2040 and developed in 2060. The day before that meeting, the agents of PAIOSA made the administrative and the technical services of the BPEAE visit the achievements installed in Kirundo and Busoni communes. Finally, the best farmers benefited from the different prices.