Woman carrying container of water on her head. - - General: General. A US$18.4 million programme, coordinated by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) provided Rwandan farmers with tons of beans, vegetables, maize and other seeds, fertilizers and thousands of hoes in late 1994 in order to rehabilitate the agricultural sector of the country, ravaged by civil war. Production of cereals and beans dropped 60 percent as Rwandans fled the hostilities, becoming refugees in neighbouring countries. Farmers normally keep seed from one harvest to plant in the following season. The war disrupted this routine. In the autumn of 1994, an estimated 850 000 farming families needed assistance.