Vermont Firm Gets $190 million USAID/Colombia Contract

A Burlington, Vermont-based research and consulting firm yesterday was awarded a $190 million contract to carry out a U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) project in Colombia. Associates in Rural Development, Inc. (ARD) received the award as part of USAID's "Areas for Municipal Level - Alternative Development Program," whose primary policy goal is to encourage Colombian coca farmers to switch to forestry and non-drug agricultural businesses. The new initiative is a follow-up to efforts by USAID's Agriculture and Alternative Development Office (AADO) to promote what it characterizes as "the production of licit crops tied to the upfront voluntary eradication of illicit crops on a community by community basis." The largest of those USAID-supported efforts in the recent past was the 2001-2005 Colombia Alternative Development Program, "which as of September 2004 had planted 35,128 hectares of legitimate crops, eradicated 19,618 hectares of illicit crops, and benefited 24,503 families."

The strategic objective that the U.S. government will pursue through ARD is formally titled “Expanded Economic and Social Alternatives to Illicit Crop Production.” According to the original request for proposals published back in January, USAID hopes to accomplish these tasks by expanding "sustainable economic alternatives (especially agricultural and forestry) and improving municipal government capacity and performance in targeted municipalities."

The challenge now, according to USAID, is:

to determine the most cost effective way to expand this initiative to achieve the Mission goal of sustainable reduction in the production of illicit drugs and the promotion of peace in Colombia.  While area planted has been reduced dramatically in some zones, it has expanded in others.  In addition, coca crops have shifted from large scale production in extensive areas to small production units co-located in more populous areas with traditional crops, and into protected national park land.  Aerial spraying of herbicides has had the greatest impact on eradication, both in terms of direct eradication and of encouraging farmers to seek alternative development assistance.

 

It acknowledged that "upfront voluntary eradication techniques" employed without the assistance of U.S. government resources "are also a key tool in the campaign to suppress illicit crops, particularly as production shifts from large-scale monoculture to smaller scale plantings interspersed with legitimate crops."

The inititative will take place within more than 80 municipalities across four regions of Colombia.