Authorities in greater Pibor plan to form cooperative

March 27, 2013 (BOR) – Greater Pibor politicians and senior officials in the state government are exploring ways of pooling their resources to develop the counties and target food insecurity in the region.

The group has suggested forming a cooperative to support farmers and business people in the greater Pibor counties of Pochalla and Pibor in South Sudan’s Jonglei state.

Under the plan, registered farmers in Jonglei’s counties will be able to apply to the cooperative for loans, with particular priority given to grassroots projects addressing food insecurity in the region.

Funds will be raised partly by group members and partly through donors, such as banks attached to the project.

Explaining the initiative, Jonglei’s minister of gender, Rachael Anok, said the plan was deeply rooted in food security projects “like tractors for loan and grinding meal machines” to reduce food insecurity and boost development in greater Pibor counties.
“Some food security projects will be given for loans”, she said after their short meeting in Bor on Tuesday.

According to Anok, the group’s main priority is to form an agricultural cooperative in order to boost food production and mitigate hunger across the region.

“We thought that the first priority is food security and with this we need to provide more food through [an] agriculture cooperative society and farmers grouping by creating and opening a bank account so that people can get agricultural loans,” she said.

Group members will contribute money to cover the cost of registering the cooperative in Jonglei – a requirement before planned projects can commence.

“This is like preparations, preparing ourselves to get [the] cooperative registered so that it won’t be illegal when there are donors [that] come to help us. After we have all the documents needed, they can give us loans,”Anok said.

Acting chairperson of the Public Service Commission representing Pibor county, Simon Gain Ngare, said the formation of a cooperative for greater Pibor was an intellectual decision.

Gain said all MPs from greater Pibor would contribute some money to officially register the cooperative with the appropriate administration body. Currently, about 10 MPs representing the two counties of greater Pibor are in the state assembly.

“We are officials from the government so we will follow up the registration process to implement it in the way we are doing it today, although the [food] insecurity is still the major priority in greater Pibor, we will start from state headquarters first,” Gain said.

Greater Pibor consists of Pibor and Pochalla counties and comprises of five major tribal groups, namely Anyuak, Murle, Kachipo and Jie.

(ST)