Education Sector Support Programme, Chimoio Agricultural Institute Component
The Finnish support to the Mozambican education sector involved various sectors, apart from the support to the general education it also included a technical and financial support to the Diploma level at Chimoio Agricultural Institute (IAC). IAC has received Finnish support since 1990, previous directed to forestry sector as part of SADC.AAA.5.9, a programme that ended in 1996. A second support programme which also included agriculture started in 1998 from where the present programme originate. The support to IAC was in 2003 incorporated into Finlands support to the general education sector. The college have today three different education programmes on Diploma level;
- Agriculture, including animal husbandry
- Forestry
- Wildlife
The overall objective of the project was to support education and training of medium level agricultural, forestry and wildlife technicians of high quality in order to meet the need of the sectors. Mozambique is undergoing social and economic changes, having experienced a long and devastating civil war and is today in a economic growth which also demands new knowledge also on medium level. Thus it is of most importance that quality and quantity of technicians correspond to present and future needs.
Education in Mozambique in principle is free of charge for the student, which has an impact in particular for costful education programmes like forestry, agriculture and wildlife. The project therefore had a major focus on institutional and financial sustainability with several income-generating components.