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| Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki |
Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki on Wednesday lambasted critics of Memorandum of Understanding he has signed with various organizations.
Obaseki said he was being called ‘Governor MOU’ but that the MOU is now yielding money for farmers in the state.
Obaseki spoke at Sobe in Owan West local government while witnessing the harvest of maize cultivated through his agropreneur programme.
A total of 400 hectares was cultivated by 180 farmers with each farmer getting five hectares with support from Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL).
Governor Obaseki said his detractors spread all sort of rumours about the project when it began two years ago.
He said the project was to help farmers eliminate risk involved in agriculture and make them do farming as business.
Obaseki, however, said the success story was possible because of President Buhari commitment to uplift the rural farmers.
The Edo governor tasked the benefitting farmers to encourage more farmer to join the scheme saying there was more money to give to them.
According to him, “We are going round communities to demand for land. Anywhere there is land, we will go there and assist farmers to make sure they farm in large hectares.
“They said I am Governor MOU. They should come and see how the MOU is turning into money. Besides grains, we are doing cassava starting with 1000 hectares for Orhia women. We are doing poultry and taken delivery of over 20,000 birds to be distributed. We are doing fishery on a large scale.
“Nigeria problem can only be solved by good leadership. Buhari has shown good leadership. He wants to help you to be prosperous.
“To do it, the governance structure must be transparent.”
Managing Director of NIRSAL, Mr. Aliu Abdulhamid, said the scheme target to empower farmers across the 18 local government areas with a target to harvest 17,600 metric tons of grains.
Abdulhamid stated that the Sobe farmers got four tons per hectare as against the target of 1.8tons.
The NIRSAL boss assured the farmers that middlemen would not be allowed to shortchange the farmers by linking them directly to the market price.
His words, “NIRSAL and Edo State Government collaboration has enabled the flow of finance, linkage to market and utilization of technologies for improved yields and guaranteed financial returns to 180 smallholders farmers.
“This can be scaled up in the next farming season. Obaseki also had an idea why can’t we extend irrigation to this area so that the farmers can grow crops three times a year. NIRSAL deployed advanced technologies. With the support of Edo State Government, this product has experienced one hundred percent in yield.”
Special Adviser of Governor Obaseki on Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security, Prince Joe Okojie, hailed Obaseki for restoring the hope of Edo farmers.
