Insurgency: 140, 000 Households with Livelihood Support in Borno

By Michael Olugbode

Over 140 000 conflict-affected smallholder farmers’ households in Borno State have been provided with the means to restore their livelihoods through sustainable agriculture.

The support was given under the European Union-funded ‘Restoring and Promoting Sustainable Agriculture-based Livelihoods for Food Security, Employment and Nutrition Improvement in Borno State’.

Prior to the breakout of the Boko Haram conflict in 2009, livelihoods in rural communities in the Borno State were centered on subsistence farming, including pastoralism, backyard poultry

production, fishery, and crop production.

As a result of the conflict, many smallholder farmers lost their agricultural assets and this resulted in high rate of youth unemployment, food shortages, malnutrition, increased poverty, gender-based violence, among others.

A project, which is implemented jointly by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UN Women and World Food Programme (WFP) in collaboration with Borno State, was introduced in 2018 to support the building of lasting peace and sustainable development to smallholder farmers following the effects of over a decade-long armed conflict.

The three years of the project’s implementation has witnessed positive transformation of the conflict-affected livelihoods through improved crop production, livestock restocking, agri-business development, safe access to fuel and energy, irrigation, among others.

The project has been very instrumental in making a lasting change in people’s lives by sustainably rebuilding their livelihoods. It provided an important impetus to the Borno State Government’s efforts to rebuild the economy through sustainable livelihoods.

Speaking at an event in Maiduguri to celebrate the success of the project, the Country Representative of Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, Mr. Fred Kafeero, said the three UN agencies have jointly worked together to implement the programme.

He explained that the project has transformed lives of thousands of people in the state through crop production, livestock restocking, agribusiness development, safe access to fuel and energy, irrigation among others.

He said: “It’s suffice to say that this project has been very instrumental in making lasting change in people’s lives by sustainably rebuilding livelihoods and providing an important foundation to the Borno State Government efforts for rebuilding the economy through sustainable livelihood.”

The UN Women Country Representative, Ms. Comfort Lamptey, and that of the World Food Programme, Mr. Ronald Sibanda, represented by Head of Maiduguri Office, Bernard Owadi, observed that the project has touched the lives of victims of insurgency as WFP alone has injected over N2.5 billion in the last three years in Borno State.