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FAO/RNE provides agricultural marketing and rural finance services at the national, sub-regional and regional levels. These services include advisory services, information, guidelines, training and technical assistance. The objective is to improve and develop need oriented, efficient and dynamic agricultural marketing and rural finance systems that can assist in achieving the general objectives of increasing food security, raising farmer’s incomes, improving accessibility to food and enhancing the modernization and commercialization of agriculture.
A number of national projects benefit from technical support of this unit including:-
- TCP/EGY/6612 (a) - Agribusiness Development in the New lands-Egypt
 
- YEM/97/300 - Poverty alleviation Project-Marketing Component
- UNTS/YEM/003/CDF - Wholesale Fruits and Vegetables Assembly Market in Al-Husainiah
- GCP/SYR/006/ITA - Agricultural Policy
- TCP/JOR/8923 - Marketing, Urban Food Distribution
- TCP/SUD/0065 - Gezira Scheme Project.
Support to rural finance is provided mainly through liaison with the FAO-initiated and now well-established Near East and North Africa Regional Agricultural Credit Association (NENARACA). Recent activities on Rural Finance include a Seminar on "Towards Universal Rural Banks," organized by NENARACA in cooperation with RNE, technical support for introduction of Micro-Banker in some countries of the Region, and technical publications including 4 training modules in agricultural credit administration produced in co-operation with NENARACA. A report on the situation of agricultural credit and rural finance in selected Near East countries has been compiled for the use of the countries of the region in cooperation with NENARACA.
In the field of agricultural marketing, technical backstopping is provided to the Agricultural Food Marketing Association for the Near East and North Africa (AFMANENA), which was initiated by FAO. Marketing development at national and regional levels and the promotion of intra-regional trade are emphasized through the AFMANENA-embodied Technical Cooperation Among Developing Countries (TCDC) mechanisms. Also in cooperation with AFMANENA, a regional seminar on the impact of effective food quality control on agricultural marketing and trade in the Near East was organized.
Other RNE marketing activities include:
§ The preparation of working documents on Urban Food Distribution System in the Selected Metropolitan Areas in the Near East which were presented in a regional seminar;
§ Finalization of a technical document on the Impact of GATT on Intra-Regional Trade in the Near East;
§ Advisory assistance to member countries and technical backstopping of TCP projects.
§ Seminar on Urban Food Security, Amman, Jordan;
§ A national workshop on Improving Cereal Marketing Linkages for Enhancing Food Security and Promotion of Sorghum Export in the Sudan;
§ Regional Seminar on Agricultural Marketing Business Management Cairo, Egypt;
§ Technical Support for the Establishment and Operation of Fruits and Vegetables Assembly Wholesale Market in Yemen and for conducting problem oriented studies in agricultural marketing in Syria;
§ Technical support for Marketing Development Dairy Industry in Irrigated Areas in the Sudan. (A number of technical agricultural marketing publications in Arabic were produced).
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