William Anyuon Kuol, Minister of Trade and Industry. (PPU).

The Ministry of Trade and Industry has secured 5 million US dollars from the UN development agency – UNDP and the World Bank to support farmers across the country.

Trade Minister William Anyuon Kuol said the government’s microfinancing project will use the funding to provide loans to farmers to produce food.

Anyuon said the produce will then be bought by government to ensure food is readily available in stores.

He invites interested South Sudanese entrepreneurs to reach out and apply for the grant through the technical committee leading the initiative.

“We have planned as the government to make sure we empower our farmers because we need to give them the loan through microfinancing. We already secured like five million US dollars from our partners – UNDP and World Bank,” he said.

“We will assess them (farmers) and then give them money so that they go and produce. When they produce, the government will have a strategy way of buying this food from them and whenever we need food will be ready.”

“We have formed at the technical body and that body has been supervised by the undersecretary in that body. We must make sure that anybody applying for the fund meets the criteria.”

Anyuon said the ministry and partners have established what he called e-commas.

Minister Anyuon said the project will be implemented by his ministry with support from UNDP and World Bank.

On the 15th of March during a cabinet meeting, the government spokesperson said a bill is being drafting for the establishment of a Food Reserve Agency that will buy and store food surplus from farmers across the country.

Michael Makuei Lueth said the body will also be in charge of distributing the commodity especially to areas where there is food scarcity.