United Agro Projects: A Life Line in Rural Georgia

Last week, Agro Leader Ltd opened a new fruit and vegetable preserve factory in Ptsala village in the Shida Kartli region in eastern Georgia. Financed by the United Agro Project, the factory is another promising project to open in rural Georgia. The factory will be used to preserve up to 720 tones of fruits and vegetables each year to be sold at local markets.

Agro Leader Ltd received over $453,932 from the United Agro Project to fund the construction of the factory. The village will benefit from the additional jobs it creates: 20 permanent staff and 10 seasonal staff will work in the factory.

Georgia has a long-standing tradition as an agricultural country. Indeed, rural Georgia is heavily reliant on agriculture. With 22 micro-climates, ranging from cool and dry to warm and humid, Georgia has an especially long harvesting season and a variety of growing conditions.

Today, agriculture accounts for 8.1% of Georgia’s GDP. Around 55% of the labor force in Georgia is employed by agriculture, although much of these roles are subsitence farming.

Given the importance of agriculture in Georgia, projects such as those financed by the United Agro Project are vital for the rural economy. Launched in 2013 by former Georgian Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili, The United Agro Project has financed over 188 new factories to date. The Shida Kartili region has already benefited from 23 new factories.

The United Agro project was launched to improve agricultural production, storage, and sale in Georgia. “We have decided from today to gather all ongoing projects under the United Agro Project to make our work more efficient and enable people to benefit more from state agricultural changes,” said former PM Kvirikashvili at the project launch.

There are various projects joined under the umbrella of the project, including: ‘Plant the Future,’ a project which hopes to promote effective cultivation of agricultural land in Georgia; the ‘Georgian Tea Plantation Rehabilitation Program,’ to encourage high-quality tea production; the 'Program of Agro-production Promotion’ within the framework of the Agriculture Modernization; the ‘Market Access and Resilience Project;’ ‘Young Entrepreneur, a program supporting youth in rural areas; as well as the co-financing of agro-processing and storage enterprises, agro-insurance, and the ‘Preferential Agrocredit Project.’

The Agrocredit Project has proven to be especially successful, enabling farmers to access long-term loans with preferential conditions. From 2013 - 2016, the government issued loans worth over $222,428,131 to more than 700,000 Georgian agriculturalists.

Despite the success of various agricultural projects, rural areas often still suffer from a lack of infrastructure and access to resources, and poor economic standards. In addition, problems such as the stink bug invasion which began in 2015 has made agriculture even more challenging in Georgia. Although projects such as the United Agro Project and funding from abroad, like that received from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), help to ease the burden, farmers still struggle.

Georgia’s rural population is decreasing as the people increasingly choose to move to larger towns and cities. In fact, the rural population decreased from 48.2% in 2011 to 46.3% in 2014. The success of projects such as the United Agro Project will prove vital in curbing this trend and continuing to progress Georgian agriculture in the right direction.

By Amy Jones

Image source - APMA