Fishermen stretch their nets to dry on the dock after a day of fishing for tuna which will be sold by women at a SCAPA market. They are from one of the artisanal fishing communities being helped by SCAPA, the Cape Verde state enterprise assisted by FAO. - - ARPA. Cape Verde is an archipelago of small islands of volcanic origin with sparse rainfall and uneven terrain, thus depriving the country of a broad agricultural base. Cape Verde has suffered major losses of livestock and fodder and maize crops, due first to droughts and later to torrential rains that damaged terraced crop lands. A project sponsored by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)"Rehabilitation of Agriculture in Africa" (ARPA) helped Cape Verde improve its fish distribution and marketing network from artisanal fishing communities to urban consumer centres, and to increase the country's food resources and bring in foreign earnings from export of lobster, tuna and fish products. FAO assisted the Cape Verde state enterprise ?Society for the Commercialization and Support to the Artisanal Fisheries? (SCAPA) in its work.