Nigeria's Agriculture News|Discussions

I quite agree with the expert...they can use it to make cassava bread also...it tastes like regular bread to me.Have a lady that does cassava,sweet potatoe and plantain bread here.I also think they can do cassava fries...I like cassava fries.

colonial pikin,
African Cassava Agronomy Initiative to Change Fortunes of Farmers

The African Cassava Agronomy Initiative (ACAI) project kicks-off today with plans to improve the livelihoods and incomes of cassava farmers in Nigeria, Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda, and DR Congo by researching, and tapping into and implementing best-bet agronomic practices.

The project, which is led by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) with funding support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will specifically improve cassava yields, cassava root quality, cassava supply to the processing sector, and fertilizer sales, thereby engaging over 100,000 households in Nigeria and Tanzania, and facilitating the engagement of at least 30% women farmers.

“The value of benefits from this project in Nigeria and Tanzania is projected to be over 27 million USD. Furthermore, through engagement of households in Ghana, Uganda, and DR Congo and through extra interest generated in the products developed by the project, these figures are expected to increase for at least 150,000 households and a value created of at least 40 million USD within the 5-year time frame of the project,” explained Dr Bernard Vanlauwe, IITA Director for Central Africa on Wednesday in Ibadan Nigeria.

In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), cassava productivity has marginally increased to around 10–11 tons per hectare, well below attainable yields of over 30 tons per hectare. With the need for intensifying cassava production in areas where population densities have reduced access to fallow land and with cassava roots becoming important raw material for the processing sector, this yield gap needs to be reduced.

Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Mr Audu Ogbe, said the current yield of less than 15 tons per hectare makes Nigerian farmers uncompetitive in the cassava sector.

“This initiative should find a solution to the issue of low productivity,” Ogbe who was represented by Mrs Comfort Awe said.

The ACAI initiative is placed within the context of intensification of cassava-based systems with a focus on the development of cassava agronomy recommendations to improve the productivity and quality of cassava roots in Nigeria, Tanzania, Ghana, and Uganda, major cassava-producing countries in West and East Africa, and some spillover into East DR Congo. The project will be phased, starting in Nigeria and Tanzania in years 1 and 2 and will expand to the other countries from year 3 onwards.

Dr Nteranya Sanginga, IITA Director General said agronomy would provide the key to unlocking the potential of cassava in Africa.

“If we want to increase the productivity of cassava, we must breed new varieties, improve the agronomy and value addition. I think we have done a lot in the area of breeding, what we need to do now is to capitalize on the agronomy,” Dr Sanginga said.

The ACAI project will harness African and international expertise, and follows a demand-driven approach whereby its interventions are responding to specific agronomy-related needs by partners already actively engaged in cassava dissemination and value chain activities in the target countries.

The vision of success of ACAI is to deliver the necessary knowledge base and tools for accessing this knowledge to cassava scaling partners and ultimately farmers in the target countries while instituting the necessary capacity and skills for national system scientists to engage in transformative cassava agronomy.

“The ultimate goal is to improve the productivity per unit area,” Dr Abdulai Jalloh, Project Coordinator for ACAI said.

It is envisaged that through institutionalization of innovative approaches for problem-solving, the initiative will build the capacity of national partners to sustain the technology development pipeline, deliver continuous improvements in cassava agronomy technologies, as well as address new constraints.

www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/African-Cassava-Agronomy-Initiative-to-change-fortunes-of-farmers-412243

Source:Vanguard

colonial pikin,Honorebu,



Agriculture is the way to go in Nigeria —Olafunmiloye

You are a legal practitioner, a woman and you are here heading an agency in charge of wealth creation. How would you describe yourself ?

You’ve described part of it. I am a woman. I am a lawyer by profession. I’ve been a lawyer for 16 years and an agriculturalist for two years. I am passionate about youth employment and empowerment. I think this is what has really driven me to try and perform.

What’s the mandate of the Ondo State Wealth Creation Agency, WECA?

Our main focus is looking at the opportunity of how our people can create wealth through agriculture. Our key mandate is to see the opportunities in the agricultural sector and to ensure that not only that the youths are attracted to the sector but they are retained and make a living in it. We look at all the opportunities, especially the value chain available. When we talk about agriculture, we are not just talking about farming. We are talking about the value chain, the different agricultural products, production, packaging, marketing and all sorts of things that deal with agriculture.

What have been the achievements of the agency since you became its chairman?

The agency was established in 2009. It is one of the first agencies that Governor tried to put in place to be able to tackle the issue of unemployment. Several youths have benefited from the programmes that he put in place. Since I was appointed chairman of the agency on November 15, 2013, a lot of things have happened and we’ve had quite a number of achievements. The agency has four agro cities. These are farm settlements that we run. They spread across the state. We have one at Ore in Odigbo Local Government Area, southern senatorial district of the state. We have one in Epe, Ondo East Local Government Area which is in the central senatorial district. We have two in the northern senatorial district, one at Ishuada in Owo Local Government Area and the other one in Auga in Akoko Northeast Local Government Area. Basic agricultural facilities were put in place. The idea is that the youths will be trained and whatever is learnt will be translated up there. We restructured the existing programme and called it pro-farmer, Agropreneuor Sustainance Scheme.

Graduates are engaged, trained for a period of one to one and half years on agricultural best practices in key areas such as cassava cultivation, maize cultivation, vegetable cultivation, broiler production, fish farming and cattle rearing. We also have sericulture, bee-keeping and honey production. We launched the programme in 2014 and started with 280 young graduates. But as at now, we have 400 young graduates within a space of one and half years. We have several collaborations. We have collaboration with the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture, IITA, for technical training. We also collaborated with USAID on best practices, especially on agric business and agric entrepreneurship scheme. We collaborated with SURE-P Graduate Internship Scheme. Under this scheme, they had the opportunity of getting a monthly stipend of N20,000.

Apart from training programmes and collaborations, we’ve also done enough in terms of production. Mr. Governor was able to clear a thousand of hectares of land just for cultivation of cassava and maize. As I speak now, the harvest and milling of the maize is going on. We’ve been able to cultivate 500 hectares of cassava, 300 hectares of maize just between 2014 and 2015. We’ve also been able to produce 15,000 broilers, both life and frozen. We’ve been able to set up a chicken processing plant, the first that is functional in Ondo state. We’ve also been able to produce 40,000 catfish in three circles. We have both life and smoked catfish. We have 100 cows. There is so much attraction to agriculture. We now have youths coming to us that they are interested in agriculture. With a lot of sensitisation, we’ve let them see how attractive agriculture can be. Infrastructural development is another key one. We’ve provided hostels, poultries, dams, fish ponds. We’ve provided a lot of facilities.

What have been the challenges?

The initial challenge was that a lot of our youths didn’t want to go into agriculture. We spent a lot of time on publicity, advocacy, adverts encouraging youths that agriculture is the way to go. They were not really interested in agriculture because of the perception we have about it. The perception is key and that is a major challenge for us. We need to change the perception of what agriculture should be. It does not encourage us. It is not attractive. We are trying to change the face and perception of agriculture into something that is modern and attractive. It is a challenge and we’ve really been working on it. The second challenge was funding. It is still a challenge but let me tell you it has come in different stages. We were able to get out of that problem because we are collaborating with the federal government to provide specific funding. It can never be enough because we have over 400 youths and still have 2000 that want to be involved in the project. With collaboration, we are able to have funding for some of our projects. But it can never be enough. Climate is affecting us. There was a change in climate in 2014 and 2015. It rained all the way to December in 2014. The rain stopped sharply at the beginning of November in 2015 without any notice. It started late in 2015, about late June or July. Rain is supposed to start as far back as March, I mean the one that will allow farmers to crop. So, we have a challenge in terms of climate change. A lot of farmers cannot plant at the right time. The major challenge now is the sustainability of the project. You are aware the administration is winding up and we need to make sure we have a sustainable system in place.

What’s your relationship with the Ministry of Agriculture?

We work together. In fact, 90 per cent of the staff of WECA were deployed from the Ministry of Agriculture. But we have clear roles. The role of WECA is to develop the mindset of the youths and their skills for agriculture so that we can have a new crop of agriculturists. But the Ministry of Agriculture deal with everybody interested in agriculture.

What’s your advice to the teeming youths that want to become pro-farmers?

I keep saying that 2016 is the year of agriculture. Anybody that really wants to know about agriculture, this is the time. People will always eat. You might decide not to buy fuel in your car, park it and take Okada. You might decide not to buy kerosine but opt for firewood. But you must eat at least once in a day. It means that provision of food is still constant irrespective of the economic situation. The youths have the opportunity to understand the agricultural sector. You don’t have to be a farmer. You can produce, you can package, you can market. Agriculture is the only sector that gives everybody the opportunity to play. It is the only sector that does not discriminate in terms of educational qualifications or statues. You don’t have to have a degree of knowledge before getting into the field. But it is the only sector that is underutilized.

nationalmirroronline.net/new/agriculture-is-the-way-to-go-in-nigeria-olafunmiloye/

colonial pikin, ooh maaan don't tell me you're not aware of this. Nothing serious will happen until they start killing these lunatics

For how long have they been dialoguing?.These guys are wrecking havoc all over the country SS,SW,SE,NW,NE

They should simply stop them from doing this nonsense.This is 2016 for God sake