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The Sunny DeLegend Services Limited, an NGO in collaboration with Kogi Government on Saturday trained 500 farmers, with the theme: “Agriculture Beyond Food & E-commerce Training”.
The Managing Partner of the NGO, Mrs Joy Amuta, told journalists at the venue in Lokoja, that the training would cut across areas such as Agric (food, fashion, recycling and real estate).
She added that 10000 farmers have been targeted through value chain with ICT including benefits such as workshop, business plan, loan facilities, off-takers opportunity, partnership and business connection.
According to her, almost everything we are using today has over 90 per cent agriculture as the raw materials either directly or indirectly.
“Many people do not know that with agriculture you can become a millionaire, and that is the reason we are trying to educate, sensitise and train them in that aspect.
“We want people to see agriculture as not just to feed themselves and families, but to take it as a serious business so that they can also earn big money from it.
“We are also partnering with Tehilla Shelter Foundation, Heal4Africa Initiative, SMEDAN and other stakeholders to bring hope to the people and restore to them what they had lost in agricultural.
“Today, we are opening the mind of the participants that they can actually channel whatever passion they have into agriculture; you can source your income from agriculture and use it to develop your passion.
“You can be a farmer today and three years after you may choose to become a fashion designer, you can actually fund your fashion designer from agricultural proceeds,” she said.
Amuta commended Kogi Commissioner for Agriculture, Hon Kehinde Oloruntoba, for making the program a success, saying the farmers are are ready to really engage in mechanized farming.
“We are taking this training round the whole 21 local government areas of the state to ensure that every interested farmer benefited from it.
“We will educate, sensitise, train and give them the necessary information on how they can easily access these funds.
“We urge all farmers across the state to take advantage of the program and key into it”, she said.
She noted that the organization had mapped out 1000 hectares of land for this wet season, but the main challenges was land clearing, saying the commissioner has promised to facilitate the clearing.
In his remarks, the Commissioner for Agriculture, Mr Kehinde Oloruntoba, commended the organisers for the initiative, saying it was a wonderful project and a way of making the people very rich.
According to Oloruntoba, there is land, water and people; and the government is supporting agriculture, but we need the NGOs to partner with us to educate and train the farmers.
“The Federal and Kogi Government want to make agriculture the main source of income which is the abundant natural resources that God has given us.
“Gov Yahaya Bello wants to make many farmers to be millionaires through various farming programs, but when you don’t know that those opportunities exist, you will not be able to access them.
“So, program like this will create an avenue to let our people know those opportunities that is available to them and take advantage of them”, he said.
He said that Kogi government would establish ‘Agricultural Equipment Lease Centres’ in some strategic areas across the state where farmers could lease farm equipment like tractors at a subsidized rate.
He added: “We have advertised it on national dailies few days ago and in the next 15 days, bidding would be opened.
“We have also completed land mappings few days ago for 4800 farmers with minimum of one hectare each, for proper information and accurate data to eliminate sharp practices”.
One of the participants, Mrs Mary Folorunsho, said that she came to learn more about agriculture, and that she had really learned a lot from the training
“I wish the organizers of the training well because they are impacting lives, I pray for more grace for them to do more exploits,” she said.
Another participant, Clement Ilegoke, said: “I think we are impressed because the loans are well explained and we are all ready to go back to the farm and make the state proud”.
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