FG Eyes 5 million Jobs from Agric Mechanisation Programme

The in-kind facility was designed to help Nigeria attain food security, create jobs and diversify the economy from oil.

Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the President on Agriculture, Mr Andrew Kwasari, in a statement noted that the agricultural machines would come from Brazil.

He said when the programme takes off fully, it would create at least five million jobs and 35 million nutritional effects and economic impact on Nigerians.

Mr Kwasari said the agricultural machines from Brazil would set the basic foundation across 632 out of the 774 local government areas for proper agricultural service.

These machines, he added, would be leased out to the farmers for a fee, adding that the operations would be privately managed in a competitive manner.

He stated, “Services ranging from land preparation to harvest and storage will be provided timely and on-demand to all farmers in a move to enhance productivity of smallholder farmers that don’t need to own tractors and implements.

“Over 142 agro-processing factories will be situated across all senatorial districts to create aggregation, intermediary and final processing of the increased farm outputs on the back of the 632 primary production supporting service centres in the respective LGs.

“This is meant to tackle the primary issues of post-harvest losses commonly suffered by smallholder farmers as well as to domesticate efficient supply chain operations where factories or aggregation hubs are closer to sources of raw material.”

Speaking further on job creation, training and technological skill transfer, Mr Kwasari explained that the programme was tailored to cater to the needs of private operators of the service centres, farmers, extension workers, regulatory and research institutions, among others.

He also disclosed that by 2023, Nigeria would have attained food security for the various plant and livestock-related commodities identified to be supported by the programme across the states.