Established in 1943, CRS is engaged in humanitarian relief and development efforts in nearly 100 countries worldwide. CRS works with partner organizations, strengthening their capacity to respond to emergencies, fight disease and poverty, nurture peaceful and just societies, and promote human development. Although our mission is rooted in the Catholic faith, our operations serve people based solely on need, regardless of their race, religion or ethnicity.
CRS’ Farmer to Farmer Program is implementing a second round of the five-year program to promote sustainable economic growth, food security and agricultural development in Uganda, Ethiopia, Nepal and Timor Leste. CRS’ Farmer-to-Farmer program sends U.S. volunteers with agricultural expertise to share skills and help build capacity for farmers through short-term training and technical assistance projects.
Volunteer technical assistance from U.S. farmers, educators, agribusinesses, cooperatives, and universities helps developing countries improve productivity, access new markets, and conserve environmental and natural resources.
Farmer-to-Farmer volunteers work with farmers, producer groups, rural businesses, and service providers to develop the local capacity necessary to increase food production and rural incomes, expand economic growth, and address environmental and natural resource management challenges.
This people-to-people exchange promotes international goodwill, understanding of U.S. foreign assistance programs, and private involvement in development activities.
As an implementer of the 35 year old Farmer to Farmer Program (F2F), CRS will host over 500 project assignments over the 5-year life of the project, to increase the productivity and marketing of key priority value chains, including livestock and grains, in line with USAID’s Feed the Future initiative.
The program benefits hundreds of host organizations, and hopes to train 19,000 people, more than half of whom will be women. The Farmer to Farmer Program works to maximize its impact through clustering assignments to build geographic capacity or through multiple assignments addressing different disciplines to provide comprehensive technical assistance as needed.
CRS is one of 9 organizations implementing Farmer-to-Farmer around the world.
For more information on F2F, please visit: http://www.Farmer-to-Farmer.org.
