The Program was conceived during the third Armenia Diaspora conference and was adopted by Armenia Fund in June, 2007, during the meeting of the Fund’s Board of Trustees.

Border villages have strategic importance for Armenia. Having strong rural communities is vital both for security reasons and for the overall economy of the country. Realizing projects in the border villages also creates a valid perspective for cross border cooperation.

The main problems in Armenia’s rural communities are:

Armenia Fund sees the solution to the problem in promoting short and long term economic activity in the rural areas. The program will renovate and install necessary infrastructure (roads, water supply, etc.). The social infrastructure will be an equal priority so as it can meet basic social service needs (school, health and information).

The Program requires involvement of villagers in all phases of project implementation.
Implementation of the Program will be comprehensive and consistent. The solutions in the general framework of Rural Development Program will be village specific.

Rural Development Program's partners in implementing the Program are:

Armenia Fund will use the cluster concept in the implementation. Thus we will be able to:

Cluster selection is based on:

Parallel to implementation of the Khashtarak cluster, other clusters are being defined. Work will commence shortly in the second and third clusters of villages and the program will spread throughout the country.