The head of the Dutch Embassy in Lagos, Michel Deelen, has urged Nigerian farmers to embrace commercial agriculture for self-sufficiency. He stated this during the launch of the packaged nutritious food, Tom Brown, produced by the villagers with the support of Dutch funded project in Nigeria, 2SCALE Project at Pampaida village in Ikara local government area of Kaduna State.
Deelen explained that the call became important in view of the fact that it would not only aid the villagers become self-reliant but enable them also to become employers of labour.
Pampaida is one of the remote villages in Nigeria supported by 2SCALE. The same location is where the Millennium Village Project, with financial support from the United Nations (UN) and Japanese Government, has been taking place for over 10 years.
He observed that the technical-know-how of making money is far better than the immediate financial gains.
“I am glad to see you learning what will brighten your future. Of course, this is another way of helping people to help themselves and this is the successful 2SCALE approach in Nigeria,” he said.
The national cluster advisor of 2SCALE, Mr Thompson Ogunsanmi said that their International Fertiliser Development Centre (IFDC), in conjunction with other consortium in the 2SCALE Project, is currently supporting over 42,000 farmers in nine states across Nigeria on profitable agricultural businesses with public private partnership (PPP) approach.
“We highly appreciate the efforts of Pampaida community for producing Tom Brown and we will ensure that the women processors are supported so that the business model is sustainable. We will establish linkages with traders in the Kaduna metropolis and ensure that the product is commercialised across the country. In this village, 620 farmers are being supported in 29 cooperatives,” he said.
