The Tonle Sap Poverty Reduction and Smallholder Development Project (TSSD) is designed to foster community-driven infrastructure, and capacity development for 1,241 Livelihood Improvement Groups in 1,193 villages, in 196 communes, in 28 districts in five target provinces.The additional financing to the TSSD (TSSD-AF) will expand activities on climate-responsive productive infrastructure from 196 communes in five provinces (Banteay Meanchey, Kampong Cham, Kampong Thom, Siem Reap, and Tboung Khmum), to 271 communes in seven provinces, including the two additional provinces of Battambang, and Prey Veng in the Tonle Sap Basin, and further develop an enabled environment for agricultural productivity, diversification, and climate resilience.

The project seeks to improve livelihoods of about 630,000 households in the five provinces in Tonle Sap Basin by 2020 through (i) improved rural infrastructures to support agricultural productivity, market access, and the quality of life in rural communities; (ii) improved capacity of smallholder farmers to increase agricultural productivity; (iii) improved agricultural policy environment, (iv) improved availability and access to quality seeds; (v) increased access to agricultural information and market data; and (vi) effective project management that enables timely project completion within the agreed budget.

The TSSD is co-financed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the Government of Finland and the Royal Government of Cambodia. 

The TSSD has two Executing Agencies, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) and the National Committee for Sub-National Democratic Development Secretariat (NCDDS), and three implementing agencies (IAs) – MAFF General Directorate of Agriculture (GDA), NCDDS and Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication (MPTC), and through their respective sub-national level bodies. The project steering committee is headed by the Council for Agriculture and Rural Development (CARD) and convened twice a year.