After several months of discussions and reflections, the first workshop of the ENPARD South Support Programme in Jordan was organised in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture on 11 and 12 July 2017 on the agricultural cooperatives system.
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The workshop took place over two days and brought together more than 35 participants from the various stakeholder groups involved in the Jordanian cooperative agricultural system (Jordanian Cooperatives Corporation, national agricultural research centre, farmers’ union, agricultural cooperatives and representatives from the private sector such as agricultural exporters).
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The first part was dedicated to presentations and general discussions on the current situation of Jordanian agriculture and its cooperative system, the deadlocks and difficulties hindering its development, but also the solutions and levers to be pulled to promote its development.
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This part was introduced with a welcoming speech by Dr. Radi Tarawnah, Director General of the Jordanian Cooperatives Corporation, and a presentation by Dr. Tahani Abdelhakim, CIHEAM-IAMM expert in charge of the Support Program in Jordan, who described the general objectives of ENPARD South along with the methodology, the programme of the workshop, goals and expected results.
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The European expert on cooperatives subsequently presented the European experience in terms of cooperative system, particularly the French one, showing the evolvement of the cooperative model, the functions of cooperatives, their strategic role in the agricultural sector, their founding principles and management methods.
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To conclude the presentations, the Deputy Director of the JCC, Dr. Khaled Tawalbah, made a comprehensive presentation of the Jordanian cooperative system, emphasizing on their crucial role in Jordan (number of cooperatives, functions, geographical distribution, flagship projects undertaken by cooperatives, etc.).
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The second part of the workshop was dedicated to discussions between the participants. The latter were divided into two working groups and a strategic framework was presented in order to better situate the questions and debates.
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The framework was based on three stages in order to meet specific objectives:
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Determining the current characteristics of the Jordanian agriculture, its current and future challenges;
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Analyzing the current situation of cooperatives with a focus on problems met, obstacles and strong points of the agricultural cooperative system;
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Establishing general guidelines for the elaboration of a strategy aiming at developing and improving agricultural cooperatives.
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In the first exercise to define Jordanian agriculture, several points emerged as essential determinants:
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Lack of water resources;
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Fragmentation of agricultural properties and prevalence of small holdings;
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High cost of production (due to the fact that most production inputs are imported);
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Problems with marketing and control over middlemen;
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Weak financial resources and revenues of most farmers;
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Self-sufficiency in vegetables, certain fruits combined with high dependence on imports of cereals.
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After defining Jordanian agriculture, each of the groups of participants identified the main problems and obstacles to agricultural cooperatives development as well as the strengths of the Jordanian cooperative system.
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Following a pooling of these diagnoses, a discussion was initiated to establish a series of recommendations and to draw general guidelines for the construction of a development strategy aiming at increasing the effectiveness of agricultural cooperatives and giving them a core role.
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Following the presentations of the preliminary results of this discussion, and taking into consideration the importance of the issue and the necessity of elaborating a strategy on solid basis, the following recommendations were made:
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Dr. Radi Tarawnah will be in charge of forming a working committee representing all the stakeholders and groups that participated in the workshop (national agricultural research center, Ministry of Agriculture, agricultural cooperatives, farmer’s union, and JCC) to further deepen the results of the workshop and provide data to support the ideas suggested during the workshop;
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In addition to the working committee activities, study cases will take place for a certain number of cooperatives that will represent the diversity of Jordanian cooperatives. The case study will be conducted directly on the field with employees and members of the cooperatives that will provide a detailed description of the current on-field situation and to ensure that the point of view of local stakeholders is taken into consideration;
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A first draft of the guidelines for the elaboration of a development strategy for the Jordanian cooperative system will be developed and sent to the ENPARD South Support Programme team for validation;
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Based on the first draft, a workshop will be organised at a large scale to present, discuss the paper and modify it in order to have a complete and final document at the end of the workshop.
