(MENAFN - Pajhwok Afghan News) KABUL (Pajhwok): The Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock would provide 600 bee hives, 28, 000 home gardens or vegetable fields, 17, 000 chicken farms, 12 fruits processing centers and 100 slaughter units to women this fiscal year, the minister said on Saturday.

Nasir Ahmad Durrani told a conference participants in Kabul that the plans had been included in the ministry€™s ongoing fiscal budget.

However, he did not go into further details about the plans but said women played a key role in the agriculture sector and their empowering would help achieve economic prosperity and enable the gender to meet their families€™ needs.

Over the past few years, the agriculture ministry has built 51, 000 home gardens and vegetable fields for women who are now cultivating deferent types of vegetables there.

At the day-long conference in Kabul, dozens of government officials, donor organizations€™ representatives and women agriculture professionals were in attendance.

First Lady Rula Ghani, who also participated in the conference, said statistics showed 60 percent of Afghan women were busy in agriculture and had played a vital role so far in the society and families€™ prosperity

She added women must be supported in learning new methods of agriculture and should be distributed relevant equipment and machinery.

Women€™s affairs minister, Dilbar Nazari, also spoke on the occasion and said a large number of Afghan women were playing an essential role in the agriculture sector but the lack of capital and access to market were major issues for them. She urged the ministry of agriculture to pay a serious attention in this regard.

Meanwhile, FAO country director in Afghanistan Tomio Shichiri said the Afghan women played a key role in family and community economy and said steps would be taken to increase their capacity.

Shafiqa Wahidi, an agriculture professional woman, said she was a widow and was raising her children with income from her home vegetable garden which had been provided by the ministry of agriculture.

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