UNICEF and LOST start
a dairy incubator in Baalbeck

Will employ 200 youths and support

tens of farmers and serve 100,000 people

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture and in partnership with the Lebanese Organization for Studies and Training (LOST), have launched ‘Al Qaria’, an incubator dedicated to the production of dairy products, in Iaat, a town in the Baalbek district.

UNICEF and LOST aim to provide jobs to 200 youths through this project which has a budget of $800,000. This will start gradually as it expands and increases its production, according to UNICEF Lebanon Country Office.

The project focuses on supporting young people to become entrepreneurs and lead their own businesses. The founders provided training and employment to 334 youths in different occupations when they were setting up the incubator. These youths include 68 persons who were trained and employed in livestock and dairy production, 92 in construction work, 26 in sanitation, and 148 in the maintenance of agricultural machinery and equipment.

The incubator will train at least 100 farmers on livestock management to improve the quality of their milk production. This will enable them to sell the milk to the incubator which will also buy fodder from 60 farmers on a daily basis. More than 200 farmers will have access to coaching and technical support and will be allowed to use the facility ten hours per day to produce their own cheese, butter, and yogurt.

The project will provide affordable dairy products to around 100,000 families in neighboring villages and communities. When the incubator is fully operational, it will be capable of collecting 15 tons of milk on a daily basis, and supplying two to three tons of dairy products to the local market, at prices up to 15 percent less than market prices. Five percent of the incubator’s production will be donated to vulnerable individuals.

In 2022, the UNICEF-LOST partnership supported 8,000 young people. This is a part of UNICEF’s focus on addressing the increasing vulnerabilities of young people aged between 15 and 24 through learning promotion, skill building, economic empowerment and entrepreneurship, youth leadership, active citizenship, and social protection.