By Bukola Adewumi
The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, USAID in collaboration with Partnership Initiative in Niger Delta (PIND), says plans are underway to boost local production of fish in the country.

Dr Ime Umoh, Director of Fisheries in the Ministry disclosed this in Abuja on Monday said the aim was to ensure food security and meet huge demand potentials.

He spoke at a virtual valedictory workshop on Aquaculture Most Impactful Practice (MIP) under the Feed the Future Nigeria Agricultural Extension and Advisory Services Activity.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Feed the Future Nigeria Agricultural Extension and Advisory Services Activity is a five-year (2020-2025) USAID funded project in collaboration with PIND.

The project is being implemented in Benue, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Kaduna, Kebbi, and Niger states by Winrock International.

The $16.6 million investment project which is focused on maize, rice, soybean and aquaculture is expected to expose at least two million smallholder farmers to new technologies between 2020 and 2025.

He said this has become imperative because the fisheries sector is one of the most important sectors in Nigeria, both from an economic and social standpoint.

Umoh said it has become very important to develop the sector because of its contribution to the country’s GDP, its support directly and indirectly to the society, and contributes to the livelihood, employment, and household food security of, especially, Nigeria’s coastal communities, including the Niger Delta.

The director said that the ministry has a goal of increasing domestic fish production and bridge the demand gap by supporting smallholder farmers to reduce hunger and poverty in the country.

Umoh said that the adoption of the MIP for aquaculture would promote business solutions for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) through extension delivery.

“The ministry has formulated policies to boost fish production and are collaborating with development partners, MSMEs and farmers as well as promoting investment in the aquaculture to sustain production levels.

“An example of such collaboration is the promotion of genetically improved tilapia fish seedlings in partnership with USAID and World Fish.

“I enjoined the experts present to review the findings being presented using the juvenile based model approach as an MIP and make their contributions so upon validation of the most impactful practice, the proposed business solutions will have sustainable impact in the aquaculture sector,’’ he said.

In his remarks, the Chief of Party of the project, Dr Ben Odoemena said that there was a lot of waste and inefficiencies in what small holder farmers are doing in terms of productivity when compared to other countries.

He said that there is no better time than now to adopt the juvenile based model of fish production especially with the planned ban on fish importation by the Federal Government by the year 2022.

Odoemena said that the project will create awareness of the benefits of the juvenile based model through engagements with SMEs by establishing, teaching, and disseminating the MIP.

Dr Charles Iyangbe, Senior Agricultural Economist, Office of Economic Growth and Environment USAID, Nigeria, explained that the event provides a platform for aquaculture stakeholders to present, discuss, and prioritize the business opportunities in aquaculture.

He said it would enable smallholder farmers and small and medium entrepreneurs (SMEs) to better understand the opportunities that abound in aquaculture to enhance their income and improve livelihoods.

According to him, the workshop will also highlight the public and private sectors and the potential for job creation for youth and women in the agribusiness sector.

Iyangbe said that the workshop will discuss “process of MIP identification, business case of the MIP and sustainability and scale-up of the MIP’’ and that the aim was to increase production and efficiency by the MIP approach in the country.

He said that the platform would also afford stakeholders an opportunity to discuss business and effective partnership for Nigeria’s development through private sector engagements.

Iyangbe said there is great potential in Nigeria economic growth having the largest market in the region.

The workshop was attended by senior government officials from the federal and state government, USAID Nigeria, development partners, key private sectors companies and investors.

Others include Universities, research institutions, producer groups, lead farmers, aggregators, processors, and others engaged in the aquaculture value chain in Nigeria.

By Bukola Adewumi
The Women Farmers Advancement Network (WOFAN) on Thursday in Abuja said it has trained more than 60 extension workers from 4 states of the federation on how to use drones and other technologies to advance agriculture.

The Executive Director of WOFAN, Hajiya Salamatu Garba, while speaking with journalists, said the 60 extension workers would engage 100 farmers each on modern farm technologies.

Garba said the training also included exposing the farmers and extension workers to insurance facilities to secure their investments.

“We invited 60 extension workers from 4 states of the federation to train them on ICT led technology, in agriculture and specifically we are looking at the use of what we call RiceAdvice.

“RiceAdvice is an application that farmers and the extension workers can use to advise farmers efficiently, to be able to give them adequate information, “she said.

She said that the training included giving adequate information on climate change and weather forecast to the extension workers and farmers.

“We also brought in insurance people so that they will give us the necessary products that they have, that go in line with climate shock.

“Last year, you know that a lot of farmers faced flood issues and some faced drought, so now if any of the farmers unfortunately finds himself in that situation, what will the insurance company do?

“We will partner with them and sign a Memorandum of Understanding, to make sure that farmers meet up with their requirements, and if anything happens, they will also be there to address the situation for the farmers,” she said.

The WOFAN boss said farmers were going to be working in clusters of hundreds because they were encouraged to go into various associations and to get registered.

“That means that we’re going to have large hectares of farms like 1,000 or 2,000 hectares all together and it’s only drones that can give you the information you need within a short period of time.

“What we are doing is to download the RiceAdvice App, for all our extension workers, so it means that for all the farmers that they are working with, each extension worker is going to work with like a hundred farmers.

“We marry technology to it to increase production, like I always say, the size of Nigeria is increasing per day, we used to be 200 million, now we are talking of 230 to 240 million, farm size is reducing, and population is increasing.

“It means we have to look for technology to meet our food demands and to do that is to invest in such services which is going to be the next thing to knock off, non-oil economic production in the country.

“A lot of people are running away from technology support because it is capital intensive. The rice moisture, cost about N120,000, so if you give a cluster, they are able to determine the moisture content of whatever and it has calibration for every crop.

“As for drones, it is not possible to buy such an expensive technology, but we’re having an agreement with the technology companies. That when we put the cluster of farmers together, we can pay for these services together with the farmers contributing stipends,“ she added.