Agriculture

Melons are big in Diwaniyah governorate and getting bigger, thanks to the USAID-Inma Agribusiness Program. 

The governorate is one of the major melon producing are-as in the country where farmers plant more than an esti-mated 16,000 donums of melon annually. However, before 2010, only local varieties were grown there, which produced low yields – approximately 2.5 metric tons per donum.

The Hameediyah Mushroom Farm was established in 1984, just west of the city of Ramadi. The company is privately owned by the Khirbit family. 

Tragedy struck in 2004, when a bomb destroyed a house on the property.

Mahmmon Majeed, a young and eager farmer, wanted to expand his Dahuk feedlot business to add a butcher shop for the residents of Dahuk.  This wasn’t an easy operation for Mahmmon to create the Blann Butcher Shop.  The skills involved in breaking down carcasses takes time and effort in order to have the types of products consumers want to buy. 

Before Mahmmon first started the butcher shop, he used outdated tools and various knives to cut the meats to the specifications of his customers.  However, he soon discovered that his cutting method was wasting a large part of the carcass.  He needed help, so he turned to USAID-Inma for guidance.

Prior to opening and throughout the first months of operation the USAID-Inma meat processing s

The fish industry in Iraq floundered over the past decade.  Farmers were faced with a multitude of problems including disease, the lack of electricity, poor feed quality, lack of water and several economic hardships, such as high operations costs, low prices and transportation issues. 

The fish industry had always been a staple for the nation’s economy, but something needed to be done to revive it.

In 2008, USAID-Inma Agribusiness Program began a partnership with Iraq’s largest and best designed hatcheries to help improve carp fingerling production in Iraq.  The hatcheries had been operating at less than 20 percent of capacity due to conflict, sanctions and the shortage of water.  The hatcheries produced less than 2 million carp fingerlings, which is

The olive industry in Iraq is beginning to grow and prosper, and much of the credit for the growth belongs to the USAID-Inma Agribusiness Program.

In 2009, in accordance with Congressional mandate to work with religious minorities in Iraq, USAID-Inma specifically targeted funding to help an olive producer in Ninawa province called the Al-Zaytoon Olive Association. The funding, which totaled $700,000, helped fund new equipment, technical assistance and other development needs.

Olive groves are concentrated in northern Iraq in the Bashiqa area of Ninawa province. Olive trees have been growing in the area for more than five hundred years.