Agric Ministry, Japan Empower 150 Rice Farmers In Edo

The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD), in partnership with the Japan international Cooperation Agency (JICA) on Wednesday empowered 150 rice farmers with improved rice seeds and other farm inputs in Edo.

  Hajia Karima Babangida, Director Federal Department of Agriculture, Abuja, who distributed the farm inputs to the farmers in Benin, explained that the  development was aimed at ensuring  food sufficiency in the country.

Represented by  Engr. Aliyu Suleiman from the ministry,  Babangida said the intervention was aimed at supporting 1,500 farmers in 10 states  of  Edo, Kogi, Oyo, Ekiti, Ebonyi, Gombe,Katsina, Sokoto, Ogun and Benue.

She noted that 150 small holder farmers were selected from each of the benefitting states to cultivate one hectare of rice farm each.

She explained that each rice farmer would get 50kg of certified seeds, four bags of NPK, two bags of Urea, one litre of soil Amender, four litres of pesticides and five litres of pre/post emergence herbicides.

“This is the complete inputs needed to cultivate one hectare of farm land .It would boost the ongoing efforts of the ministry on its various interventions aimed at alleviating the impact of COVID-19 pandemic and flood on farmers and increase production in the country,” she said .

She urged  the farmers to make judicious use of the inputs so as to encourage government do more for them.

According to her,  there should be no diversion or sale of the inputs adding that, government had put mechanism in place to monitor and deal with any farmer who diverted or sold the inputs.

The State Director of Edo FMARD office,  Mr Wellington Omoragbon thanked the federal government for providing series  of agricultural programmes to empower farmers in the state.