Gilbert Ekugbe
Worried over the aging population of farmers, the management of SEEED Multipurpose Cooperative Society Limited is set to empower over 10,000 youths in Kogi and Nassarawa States to boost Nigeria’s agricultural sector.
A research by the Federal University of Technology, Ondo State, revealed that Nigerian farmers are old, with their average age pegged at 65 years, which has made the need to get more youths involved in the nation’s food sector a matter of categorical imperative.
The President and Chief Executive Officer, SEEED MCS, Mr. Lugard Okonobo, at a preparatory stakeholders meeting, stated that the 10,000 youths would be selected through the use of agromediapreneurship to promote and expand agro-products in each local government of the states.
He stated that the preparatory stakeholders’ meeting was to validate the One Local Government One Agriculture Product (OLAOP), saying that SEEED has paid working visit and had interactive meeting with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Nasarawa State; Ministry of Agriculture, Kogi State and the Office of the Special Adviser to the Executive Governor of Kogi State on Special Projects and Social Investment Programmes, to discuss modalities and strategies for the implementation of this initiative.
“It is interesting to note that in this digital age where most youth occupy the social media space, we must all collaborate to explore that space for our mutual benefits,” he said.
He noted that OLOAP, an initiative of SEEED MCS, was designed to expand the capacity for agriculture production in areas of each local government’s comparative advantage.
He explained that this could be achieved by leveraging on the demography of the youth to use the social media space to create massive awareness and campaign on the 5Ps of agriculture which includes Production, Processing, Potentials, Preservation Techniques, Packaging Possibilities and Promotional opportunities.
This would jump start massive job creation, increased revenue generation for the local government council and possibly explore the potentials offered by the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
On his part, Special Adviser to Kogi State Governor on Special Projects and Social Intervention Programmes, Mr. Abdulkareem Onyekehi Suleiman, appreciated the ingenuity of SEEED MCS’s management and its effort to positively engage youth on the right use of social media in promoting agricultural potentials available within their locality which if well harnessed will turn the fortunes of everyone in the local government and Kogi State at large.
It is worthy to note that Kogi and Nasarawa States through its Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development respectively have offered operational secretariat to warehouse the operationalisation of OLOAP for the benefit of the agro-farmers in the state with emphasis on youth and women, as strategies are already being designed to jointly mobilise relevant stakeholders and partners to avail financial, materials, technical and human resources support for the full implementation of this initiative considering the expected multiple benefits.
