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The UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID) have embarked on a US $9.6 million three-year programme to support poverty reduction in Zanzibar, according to UNDP.
UNDP said on Wednesday that more than half of Zanzibar's people were living in poverty. The island's economy had been hit by falling prices for cloves, its mainstay, and fewer tourists were visiting its beaches "due to global jitters over terrorism".
The UNDP-UK programme is supporting Zanzibar's poverty reduction plan in four key areas: monitoring, development management, public finance, and civil society and governance.
"With the government of Zanzibar putting in place the foundations for implementing its framework for poverty reduction, this programme of support is very timely, and we see it as key to improving our people's livelihoods," Julian Raphael, the principal secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs, was quoted as saying.
"This ground-breaking partnership between the government of Zanzibar, DFID and UNDP to promote pro-poor growth and build national capacity to lead the development effort marks an important step forward in the fight against poverty," the UNDP resident representative, John Hendra, said.
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