Aydin, Turkey, 14 October 2019 - 14 technical agricultural experts from 7 IsDB member countries in Africa and Middle East are now attending a two-week training in Söke in Aydin, Western Turkey under the Bank’s Reverse Linkage initiative.

The capacity sharing event, the third of its kind in 2019, is titled: “Training on Advanced Irrigation Techniques”. It commenced on 14 October as a joint effort by the IsDB Group Regional Hub Turkey (RHTR) in cooperation with the Turkish International Agency for Cooperation (TIKA) as well as Turkey’s Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The District Governor of Söke, Mr. Tahsin Kurtbeyoğlu attended the opening ceremony of the training program where Mr. Selcuk DAG represented the RHTR.

The participants, mostly irrigation experts from Djibouti, Gambia, Mozambique, Palestine, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda are attending theoretical and practical sessions on best practices in consumption of limited water resources for agricultural purposes. As part of the training, they will go through field visits to some leading Turkish companies that are the largest producers and exporters of agricultural machineries and irrigation systems in a bid to better update their experience and know-how on the latest irrigation technologies and applications.  

The training is especially designed to maximally contribute to building a special human resources capacity in the field of “Agriculture-based Economic Development” in the select African and Middle Eastern IsDB Member Countries aiming to see the participants share the findings with colleagues in their respective countries.