In the face of crashing oil price in the global market, Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, during his tour of agricultural projects backed up by Kano State government, called on state governors in the country to emulate Kano State in its efforts at boosting agriculture, food security and providing jobs for jobless citizens.
He said “Nigeria has to feed her citizens and other countries. There is a request for 37,000 metric tons of maize at N4.2 billion by Namibia. Food business is now the biggest in Nigeria. It is time for the farmers to be legitimately rich.”
The minister, commissioned 1,000 boreholes across 24 local government areas of Kano State, as part of initiatives by the state to encourage farmers to produce more wheat under its commercial agriculture programme.
While commissioning the boreholes at Alkamawa in Bunkure local government area, Chief Ogbeh said:
“I am personally excited by what I have seen here. I think the revolution in agriculture has started, and I am looking forward for the day when Nigeria will begin selling wheat and not importing wheat.”
On his part, Governor Ganduje said his administration was determined to ensure farming was all year round, pointing out that this prompted the government to drill 1,000 boreholes under a programme tagged “Drive Away Dry Season”.
“The state’s agricultural policy provide necessary impetus aimed at facilitating increased agricultural output and employment generation to the teeming populace under the newly introduced concept of developing commercial agriculture”, the governor maintained.
