On 16 October 2019, Ashgabat, representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and Environmental Protection of Turkmenistan, Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs of Turkmenistan, Ministry of Finance and Economy of Turkmenistan, and the members representing the SARD III Project gathered at the Sixth Steering Committee Meeting organized within the European Union funded Project “Support to Further Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in Turkmenistan – SARD III”. The event took place at the capital’s Yyldyz Hotel and was aimed at introducing the progress within the project and exchanging information and recommendations among involved counterparts.
Opening remarks were delivered by the Chairman of the SARD III Steering Committee Mr. Kerim Saparov and by the Head of Cooperation Section of the European Union Delegation to Kazakhstan Mr. Johannes Stenbaek- Madsen.
Team Leader of the SARD III Project in Turkmenistan Mr. Arthur Russell highlighted that the Steering Committee was created in the framework of the European Union funded project “Support to Further Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in Turkmenistan – SARD III”. “Its members include public institutions and SARD III representatives that work on the development of sustainable agriculture, rural development, and institutional support to the rural agro sector. The steering committee is an important tool for coordination between relevant stakeholders and the project team”, – said Mr. Russell.
In addition, the presentations were delivered by the SARD III specialists, who spoke about the current state and future plans of the SARD III project and its activities in Turkmenistan, including ongoing technical assistance to dairy, potato-growing sectors, ISO 17025 trainings for experts and specialists of the Public Health and Nutrition Center of the State Sanitary and Epidemiological Service of the Ministry of Health and Medical Industry of Turkmenistan, support to export promotion activities for Turkmen enterprises.
The participants of the Steering Committee highlighted the importance of the SARD III Project, gave their high rating to the actions taken by the project and discussed the plans. The attendees have highly appreciated the project performance with Arthur Russell, Team Leader of the SARD III Project, sharing his very positive impressions of the project thus far. SARD III Steering Committee members discussed the next steps for implementing the SARD III activities and agreed on action points to be taken up by the SARD III Steering Committee members and all other stakeholders involved.
About the project:
The EU-funded project “Support to Further Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development (SARD III)” is supporting the Government of Turkmenistan in the achievement of national sector objectives for sustainable agriculture, rural development and institutional support to the rural agro sector. The third phase of SARD in Turkmenistan aims to increase productivity and competitiveness of the agro-food sector through activities that improve production, processing and marketing and to strengthen the capacity of supporting public sector agriculture institutions. More information on SARD III is available at www.sard3tm.org.
