TheCable

The Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL Plc) says it is supporting 2,987 farmers with agricultural supplies in Borno state.

Aliyu Abdulhameed, NIRSAL managing director, said the decision is in support of the federal government’s efforts at restoring socio-economic stability in the state and the north-east region.

Abdulhameed was speaking during a visit to the palace of the emir of Biu in Borno.

He said the support is granted by NIRSAL as a participating financial institution under the anchor borrower programme (ABP) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

Abdulhameed said the agency will support 2,987 maize farmers with essential supplies, structuring, training and supervision during the 2020 wet farming season.

According to a statement, the farmers were structured into a group called the Maize Dealers and Marketers Association of Nigeria (MDMAN) Farmers AGC and linked with financing under the CBN ABP through the ongoing NIRSAL Agro Geo-Cooperative® (AGC) formation exercise.

Abdulhameed said the structured farmers were supplied with 59.74 metric tons of certified maize seeds and 896 metric tons of fertilizer.

He added that the farmers were also supplied with 23,896 litres of crop protection products with one knapsack sprayer per hectare for their application.

Speaking on the rationale behind choosing Borno for the event, Abdulhameed said the decision was made to allow residents to improve their livelihood as they resettle into their communities.

“We could have gone to any one of 29 states across the country where we are supporting farmers to have this event; however, we chose Borno state to help increase the confidence level of citizens as they attempt to resettle themselves into their communities and leverage on agriculture to improve their livelihoods,” he said.

“While the mechanics for conflict resolution and military activities are not our forte, we must, as a matter of national necessity, follow national efforts for peace with viable economic pathways that will gainfully engage citizens, and make our hard-fought peace sustainable. This is why we tirelessly work to innovate and deploy models such as the NIRSAL Agro Geo-Cooperative®.

“Without any doubt, sustainable economic development in any nation cannot be achieved without rural transformation and the empowerment of dwellers therein.

“With more than half of Nigeria’s 84million hectares of arable land uncultivated and a very big and captive agricultural commodity and food import substitution opportunity, we strongly believe that we can change this narrative by harnessing Nigeria’s agribusiness opportunities and potentials.”

NIRSAL said 104,000 agro geo-cooperatives have signed up for its Agro Geo-Cooperative® initiative, which is a system of primary production that invites farm neighbours into contiguous 250-hectare partnerships for the purposes of producing at scale and gaining easier access to finance, training, inputs, markets and more.