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An agricultural worker from a local NGO inspects quality of seedlings after USAID/CSP expanded the NGO’s seedling production capacity by providing it with an additional greenhouse, climate-controlled germination room, and solar farm to sustain heating and cooling systems – Baalbeck/Beqaa, Lebanon.

An agricultural worker from Cooperation Without Borders (CWB), local NGO in the Beqaa region of Lebanon, inspects the quality of seedlings. USAID's Community Support Program expanded the NGO’s seedling production capacity by providing it with an additional greenhouse, climate-controlled germination room, and germination machine to sustain heating and cooling systems. CWB provides organic vegetables and aromatic seedlings at low prices to local farmers amidst high inflation and the country’s ongoing socio-economic crisis. Agriculture in Lebanon is one of the most vulnerable sectors to climate change due to the limited availability of water and land resources and the pressure exerted by population growth and urbanization. These challenges have placed increasing financial strain on local farmers as they struggle to purchase crop seedlings and sustain their livelihoods; it also led to an electricity crisis that decreased state provision to around 2 hours per day, hindering CWB’s operational capacity to produce enough seedlings.

In response, USAID’s Community Support Program expanded CWB’s operations by providing it with a greenhouse, a climate-controlled germination room, and a germination machine to ensure continuous power supply to CWB’s seedling nurseries and sustain their heating and cooling systems. This solution is ensuring seedling climate control amidst climate change and is expected to increase CWB’s annual production to around 20 million higher-quality seedlings, which will enhance the livelihoods of local farmers by decreasing their production costs by more than 40 percent.

Expanding Seedling Production in Lebanon Amidst Climate Change

2023 Photo Contest Winner submission_type Winner
Photographer Hassan Tabikh
Copyright © 2023 Hassan Tabikh/USAID Community Support Program

Country Lebanon
Topics Agriculture, Energy, Food Security

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