By Segun Awofadeji in Bauchi
Over 30,000 farmers are to benefit from the Bauchi State government collaboration with OCP Africa School Laboratory programme that involves instant mobile soil analysis to determine the suitable fertiliser to be used by farmers in order to increase yield.
The Bauchi State Government along with three other states had entered into an agreement with the OCP Africa for the school laboratory progamme, which the state government Thursday unveiled with the mobile laboratory van presented to Governor Mohammed Abubakar for inspection.
The representative of OCP Africa fertiliser company, Idris Adamu Azare, told the governor that with the deployment of OCP school laboratory van and equipment, 30,000 farmers are targeted for the continuous programme that will be carried out every three months.
Azare said during the exercise, which also includes going round to educate farmers, samples of the soil will be taken from farmlands, analysed in order to recommend the suitable of type of fertiliser to be used.
A statement from the press secretary to the governor, Malam Abubakar Al-Sadique, Wednesday said 100 farmers are to benefit from each of the 67 communities to be covered, while 30 extension agents have been trained and provided with android devices for the programme.
The van and equipment are part of a grant of over N150 million obtained from an agreement signed between the Bauchi State Government and OCP Africa, a fertiliser producing company in Morocco, the largest company in the world.
Governor Abubakar, who inspected the van and equipment, expressed happiness that Bauchi is the first state to flag off the OCP school laboratory programme out of the four benefiting states.
The governor reiterated his administration’s commitment to the agreement entered into with the OCP Africa, saying the official launch of the programme for the four benefiting states of Bauchi, Katsina, Kano and Kaduna will hold in Bauchi.
