By Mohammed Abubakar Dutse
In furtherance of its efforts to boost wheat production, the Jigawa state government in collaboration with the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) has launched the training the trainees of 2,000 agricultural extension workers and leaders of Wheat farmers groups under the 2023/2024 national Wheat farming projects on the project management training in the state.
The training falls under its second phase of the exercise. Under the first phase of the exercise, which took place last year, over 400 participants drawn from five local government councils were taught on effective produce aggregation as a critical success factor.
Flagging up the training in Dutse, the state capital yesterday, the Managing Director of the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL), Alhaji Abbas Umar Masanawa, said that the Jigawa state government has collaborated with NIRSAL and has brought expertise and experience to bear on Nigeria’s pursuit of a bumper wheat harvest this year.
Manasawa, who was represented by Malam Suleiman Ibrahim, explained that “A total of 355 extension agents and 706 farmer cluster leaders from Kiyawa, Birnin Kudu, Ringim, Hadejia, and Kazaure took part in the first phase of the training sessions, which were held in four of the five emirates in State”.
He explained that the participants were expected to transmit the knowledge gained along with the training materials received to the members of their respective clusters of over 800 wheat farmers groups with members of 50 people each to a total of 40,000 wheat farmers registered under the state/national 2023 wheat production project”.
He stated further that in the modules for the training programme included a deep dive into possible protocol breaches and the early warning systems put in place to address the early warning systems for detecting and arresting any issues capable of derailing the project before they blossom.
Underscoring the need for Nigeria to localize the production of Wheat, Manasawa lamented that while the country was capable of producing the volume of the products that it required for local consumption, “it is regrettable that Nigeria is spending an average of $6m (six million) US Dollars importing the product annually, which is a really huge amount of money”.
According to him, “NIRSAL is an initiative of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) established to innovatively and independently de-risk agriculture and agribusiness financing in Nigeria, with a view to stimulating the flow of finance and investment into the Agricultural Value Chain from multiple sources. Logic for the Jigawa training exercise is provided by one of the five pillars of NIRSAL Technical Assistance, under which value chain fixing initiatives are researched, developed, and promoted.
On his part the JIgawa State Commissioner of Agriculture, Muttaka Namadi said the state government was keeping tabs on all collaborators, managing relationships, and supervising performances with a view to maximizing the production and sustenance of the products.
The Commissioner, who was represented by the Birninkudu zonal extension officer, Malam Hamisu B Muhammed commended NIRSAL for its commitment to the Jigawa Wheat project, counting on the support to lead to the success of the project. Similar sentiments were expressed by the participants of the capacity development programme, which, they attested maintained, has equipped them with new insights for their work.
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