MANILA, Philippines—The Rome-based International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a special agency of the United Nations, has approved a $27.12-million financing package for an agricultural and environmental project in the Cordillera northern region, an IFAD official said.

The funding, for the second phase of the Cordillera Highland Agricultural Resource Management project, will consist of $561,000 in outright grant and a concessional loan of $26.56 million, IFAD Philippines country program manager Sana F.K. Jatta told the Philippine Daily Inquirer by email.

The funding was signed by the IFAD executive board on April 24, Jatta said.

The IFAD, established as an international financial institution in 1977, finances agricultural development projects, primarily for food production in the developing countries.

The Cordillera project, the second phase of which is expected to benefit 37 towns in the province Abra, Apayao, Benguet, Mt. Province, Kalinga and Ifugao, aims mainly to improve the quality of life of the rural poor through strengthened land tenure security, food security and watershed conservation.

With this project, farm family income of the rural poor in the upland Cordillera Autonomous Region is also expected to increase through sustainable agricultural development, a document from the Department of Agriculture showed.

The document says the project’s second phase will have five components: social mobilization, participatory investment planning and land titling; community watershed conservation, forest management and agro forestry; agriculture, agribusiness and income generation; rural infrastructure development; and project management and coordination.

The project phase is expected to run for seven years until 2014.

The document says the IFAD implemented 10 projects in the Philippines totaling $125.7 million from 1978 to 2007. Amy R. Remo; edited by INQUIRER.net