Ammon News - The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) on Tuesday launched an advanced Training of Trainers (ToT) program on the Farmer Field School (FFS) approach, funded by the European Union through its Regional Trust Fund in Response to the Syrian Crisis.

In a statement, FAO Representative in Jordan Nabil Assaf said that the Farmer Field School approach has been practiced for many years in different parts of the world with considerable success, based on ‘learning by doing’ to help build the communities’ capacity for informed decision-making.

"It is a school without walls that provides a platform to the farming communities where they can share their experiences and knowledge to improve their existing practices through experiential learning processes leading towards sustainable agriculture production," he added.

This activity comes within the framework of the EU-funded project "Enhancing resilient livelihoods and food security of host communities and Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon through the promotion of sustainable agricultural development".

The main objective of this training is to support the capacity of the Ministry of Agriculture’s master trainers to establish new Farmers' Field Schools in Jordan, as the master trainers will subsequently build the capacity of another 100 FFS facilitators from the ministry that will be able to reach 1,000 farmers through the FFS approach.

The training comes as part of a series of advanced ToT trainings in many important topics such as Farm Business School, post and post-harvest facilities, pest control, modern agricultural technology, rural development, entrepreneurial projects and integrated animal production.

(Petra)