Gilbert Ekugbe
The Founder, AgribusinessNG, African Farmer Mogaji, has sensitised youths on the available funding of N22 billion meant for agriculture development in the country.
According to him, the fund made available by MasterCard Foundation in care of Sterling Bank, is a fund available for aspiring young farmers interested in agriculture, noting that the N22 billion has been lying fallow for almost two years.
At a sensitisation forum aimed at empowering 5000 youths with agric funding and empowerment at the National Stadium, Surulere, Lagos, he said Agribusiness NG has been organising youths and other people in its bid to expose them to opportunities in the nation’s agricultural sector.
“So today is just to create awareness to lead them know how to access the funding and the logistics involved, what the money is for, and different aspects of agriculture that they can go into. So primarily, we need our youth to be more exposed to know the opportunities are available,” he said.
He noted that if the youths have deployed or accessed 12 billion of the available fund in the last few years, Nigeria would have not been faced with scarcity and rising cost of food prices currently being experienced in the country.
“We are saying there is no food, cost of food is rising, the cost of living is rising, but this money is down there. So if we have deployed the first batch of 12 billion actively in the last few years, it would have reduced the pressure that we are having on food prices and demands, so it is very crucial that we bring the youths together and across the value chain. So it is not just for production, if you want to grow tomato grow anything. If you want to do transport you want to do logistics, and we have also brought various aggravators who are very crucial to this event,” he said.
