Adedapo Adesanya
By Adedapo Adesanya
The Niger State Government and an affiliate of Dutch dairy company, FrieslandCampina WAMCO Nigeria Plc, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for 10,000 hectares of land for milk production.
The agreement will see the dairy company utilize the Bobi Grazing Reserve in the Northern state for its Dairy Development Programme.
The MoU was signed by the Governor of Niger State, Abubakar Bello, and the President of FrieslandCampina Consumer Dairy, Roel van Neerbos, at the Presidential Villa in the nation’s capital, Abuja.
This deal falls in line with the Federal Government’s National Livestock Transformation Plan which seeks to grow livestock farming and transform the dairy sector to help boost the economy.
According to the dairy company, the deal will see the replication and expansion of local dairy production at the reserve similar to what has been done in the south western states of Oyo, Ogun, and Osun states as well as train dairy cooperatives in Niger State on best global practices.
“Currently, the company has developed pasture on 1,000 of the 10,000 hectares of land assigned to it at the Bobi Grazing Reserve and established key infrastructure including a milk collection centre with a high capacity cooling tank and high-quality milk testing equipment,” the firm said in a statement.
The partnership between both parties are expected to create employment and strengthen milk production techniques like it has done in Oyo, Ogun and Osun states which has seen beneficiaries including over 7000 farmers, six milk collection centres, and 20 milk collection points.
