The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) has distributed farm inputs and other support items to young farmers in Oyo state.
The materials were distributed to the beneficiaries at the IITA campus in Ibadan, the Oyo state capital, on Thursday as part of the Youth in Agribusiness (YAS) project.
IITA said the farmers were trained in different commodities and value chains to help them either start their agribusinesses or scale up existing ventures.
Speaking during the programme, Adebayo Awotodunbo, YAS project coordinator, said the participants were jointly trained in partnership with Horti Nigeria.
“They’ve been trained in technical skills as well as business skills. We have supported them to be able to start their agribusinesses and also support the accelerators we have trained to scale up their business,” he said.
“We trained about 50 participants, and after business verification, we found 31 of them worthy of this support. We don’t want to empower laziness, which is the reason we do business verification. They are youths, and we just need to support them. Training them alone is not sufficient. If you give cash support, there is a tendency that they will spend it on other purposes.
“We are looking at the ability of the participants to improve their livelihoods first and how they can increase their yield and create jobs in their community. Expanding the impact to other parts of Nigeria starts with their communities. They are also contributing to food security.”
Sope Afolayan, founder of CEID Hub, urged the young farmers to build on the foundational knowledge and access they acquired during the programme.
He said that with over 60 percent of arable farmlands in Africa, youths can build unicorns capable of creating jobs and improving sustainable agriculture in Nigeria.
“As a recent graduate from the University of Ibadan, we’ve been having theoretical aspects in the class, but this opportunity has helped me with practical experience in horticulture. It has also helped me to see opportunities outside horticulture. From field cultivation, I’ve learnt more about the nutrition aspect. The greenhouse cultivation is really an eye-opener,” Florence, one of the participants, said.
Babawale Oke, one of the beneficiaries, described the training and farming equipment as a rare opportunity.
“Starting from the training in December, it opened my eyes to so many possibilities. It has become a game-changer for me. Starting in the classroom, they taught us so many things, especially about marketing,” he said.
“When we got to the field, that was when we got the real encouragement. Within three months, we were able to make N6 million. That’s something phenomenal on different grounds, with 31 people working on just one acre. In all, we made a success story. The greenhouse is ongoing, and we are still learning. Since December, I’ve turned everything into horticulture on my farm. I’m one of the happiest men on earth today.”
The YAS project is implemented by IITA with funding support from the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
