CBD Develops Agricultural Sustainability Project for Srebrenica Survivors

CBD Executive Director Ria Kulenovic (left) with Srebrenica survivors Mevludin Oric and Sabaheta Masic and Enisa Hodzic from Connecticut Friends of Bosnia.

The Center for Balkan Development (CBD) and Connecticut Friends of Bosnia (CFOB) are excited to announce they have joined together to launch an agricultural sustainability project that will create sustainable micro-enterprises in Ilijas, a small village north of Sarajevo, where a large number of survivors from Srebrenica have resettled.

Starting later this year, project participants will receive training in sustainable agriculture and small business and cooperative management. The project will both grant money and provide small loans to encourage micro-enterprise and agricultural related businesses, and will help participants obtain building permits, maintain sanitary conditions in their barns and greenhouses, and keep their animals in good health through regular veterinary visits. The project will also assist in connecting participants with existing resources so they can market and sell their produce.

“Developing local economic initiatives are key to creating a viable economy in Bosnia,” says Glenn Ruga, CBD president. “Agriculture has always been an important part of the Bosnian economic and cultural landscape, and this initiative takes advantage of the tremendous potential of this resource.”

Before the war, agriculture and farming provided full- or part-time work to a large portion of the Bosnian population, but the war brought a 50 to 70 percent decrease in production and, as a result, nearly 80 percent of the country’s population now depends on imported food. This situation has been made worse by shifts in population. Experienced farmers migrated to cities while many urban dwellers with little farming experience moved to rural areas. But there remains much arable land in the country. About half of the land in Bosnia can be used for agriculture, according to the UN’s 2002 Report of the World Summit on Sustainable Development. With additional investments of capital and technology, the report says the yield of crops could increase by 50 percent.

Since 2001, CBD has partnered with CFOB in its program to rebuild homes for war refugees. Though the houses have provided much-needed protection and shelter, families need to generate income to sustain themselves. So in January, CBD conducted an initial assessment to address the livelihood needs of the families. Staff visited 10 families and interviewed 27 people, asking about their plans to support themselves and what help they need to become financially self-sufficient.

“While conducting research, every family we spoke with from Srebrenica was
interested in creating sustainable income through agricultural production,” says CBD Executive Director Ria Kulenovic. “In particular, families said some form of small-scale agriculture, combined with educational training, could help their family reach self-sufficiency and meet basic food needs.”

All families were enthusiastic about the opportunity to share their thoughts with our staff. As one father responsible for an extended family of 21 people explained, “With one cow I could provide milk, cheese, meat. I could breed the cow and not just feed my family, but also make some additional money for other basic living expenses like doctor visits, medicines, my children’s education, and other things needed around the house.”

By supporting entire communities of internally displaced families, CBD and CFOB will help them meet their immediate food needs while encouraging a local, self-sustaining economy in which neighbors buy, trade, and sell with each other. At the beginning, we envision a family who grows tomatoes buying or trading their crops for milk from another family who raises cows. As the community begins to stabilize, these small industries have the potential to develop and expand to local and regional markets.

In the coming year, CFOB and CBD will establish agricultural projects focusing on small-scale farming for 50 internally displaced families in Ilijas. We will target families living below the poverty line in rural areas, and we will give priority to survivors of the Srebrenica massacre.

• Over the next three years, our goals include:
• Conducting a series of trainings on agriculture and business development;
• Providing ongoing technical assistance;
  Connecting the internally displaced population with locally available resources;
• Equipping community members with materials to construct greenhouses, enhance farming plots, store produce;
• Creating a small loan fund to allow communities to purchase items such as a truck for transport to local markets, food dehydrators, livestock, etc;
• Producing a summary report that can be shared with other potential sites and collaborators.

CBD and CFOB share a commitment to rebuilding communities throughout the region. Over the past twelve years, both groups have responded to the needs of people throughout the Balkans by listening to them and involving their communities in all levels of planning and decision-making. This has meant that initial efforts to ship emergency supplies in the immediate aftermath of the war have transformed into integrated community building work. To date, CFOB has built more than one hundred homes. In Ilijas alone, CFOB built twenty-two houses for refugee families from Srebrenica who were living in appalling conditions. In our work in Tuzla from 2003-2006 with the New Initiative—a World Bank funded project—CBD supported a variety of innovative micro-enterprise projects to help provide jobs and needed community services as a way to help residents regain their sense of humanity and confidence.