Officials of the World Visions’ Integrated Management of Natural Resources for resilience in the ASALs (IMARA) project in Lodwar has today teamed up with Turkana County Cooperatives Development Officers to draw a plan of action that will see cooperative societies benefit from the resilience building program.

Philemon Kimosop, the technical specialist of the IMARA project explained that move will pave way for the officers to link the currently unlinked cooperative societies in their areas of jurisdiction with the project and set them on a path of capacity enhancement through training and mentorship.

Mr. Kimosop divulged that the program had already reached out to several existing cooperative societies engaged in beekeeping, honey harvesting, and home craft industries and benefitted them with equipment and exchange learning visits to boost their capacity for value addition and exploitation of the market for their products.

“Since the project seeks to increase the resilience of vulnerable households to climate-change-related shocks through diversified livelihoods and improved natural resource management, we have also provided scholarships to 60 persons to undertake various courses at the Lodwar Vocational Training Center to benefit the local farmers,” Kimosop added.

The meeting comes at a time when reports indicate that drought in the horn of Africa is worsening hence the need to scale up response measures and make them more inclusive to accommodate players in the cooperatives sector.