The annual event is aimed at educating and mentoring the youths on how they can use the inherent human resources in them to empower themselves, be employers of labour rather than waiting for governments and their parents to act as catalysts for their economic advancement.
The 2018 edition with the theme “Identifying and maximising entrepreneurial opportunity in a recovering economy” was used to arouse the interest of the audience in agriculture and other fields. Setting the stage for the discussion, the Kogi state commissioner for agriculture, Kehinde Oloruntoba, lamented that for so many years agriculture has been neglected for the old ones, the illiterates and other section of the society, which made the country import a large chunk of food we eat in the country. He encouraged participants to see agriculture as the best way to be self reliant a d be employers of labour.
He said, “Statistics has it that 70 percent of the uncultivated land is in Africa, countries that do not have arable land started feeding us, they reclaimed land even from rock and add technology and they started feeding us. In Kogi state, Governor Yahaya Bello made it clear that he will diversify the economy of the state using agriculture as a window because he understands that the best way to empower our people is agriculture.
“Kogi is endowed and we have good location as we are the only state being bounded by 10 states, we have large arable land, we have two great rivers and the confluence is in Lokoja. In Kogi state, we are blessed, we have land, water and to cap it up God has blessed us with youthful population. It is only in agriculture that you plant two seeds of corn and harvest uncountable seeds, but the problem is if agriculture is so lucrative, why are our people not interested in it.
“Agriculture has been made easy and fully mechanised, we have bought tractors and put them in the senatorial districts for easy access for the people, all these are geared towards encouraging people to go into farming. In the ministry we sell seeds and seedlings to people at subsidised rates. The students should know that the agriculture we practice today, we wear jackets and we don’t look rough, you don’t need to hold hoes and cutlasses you must not even be the one to do the job, you don’t need to study agriculture before you become a farmer. All you need do is a little training and these are being offered in our ministry, we have seasoned experts that can take you through.
“We are partnering with NYSC and we want to put some corpers on the farms so that we can mentor them and before they complete their youth services they can have good money so that when they go back to their states they can start life. Agriculture is the best way to be self reliant, you dont need much money to go into agriculture, with little money and right techniques”.
Apart from the commissioner, the youths were also exposed to the latest way of practising agriculture without stress and with return on investment guaranteed. The founder and chief executive officer of Farmcrowdy, Onyeka Akuma, who was represented by the business development manager, Gabriel Idenaa, said the organisation had developed a model through which people were being encouraged to invest in agriculture without necessarily being on the farm. He explained that the model tried to solve the major problems associated with farming from conception to marketing of the produce from the farms.
According to him, the youth should take advantage of the new model that has been in existence since the company started operations in December 2016 and which has been put into use on no fewer than 12, 000 farms across 10 states of Nigeria.
Idenaa said, “Having secured the land to plant on, the seeds that he has, are they being put in the right measure, the one that is every farmer’s greatest headache is where to sell the produce. We sat down and we said since the world is moving towards technology, through technological advancement we created a website and explained these procedures to well meaning Nigerians who have capacity to sponsor farms and also let them know that they can sponsor farms and employ people.
“We are working on like 10 crops, when we started our model we work on empowering farmers together, we have been able to solve every agricultural issue. We also device ways of encouraging people and explain to them how profit from such ventures will be shared. 40 percent of the profit goes to the farmer, another 40 percent goes to the sponsor, while 20 percent goes to our company.
“This is about working with farmers and youth, the advantage is that when the youths go into farming they don’t need little or no capital, we provide the capital, we will give you the needed technical assistance, give you agricultural extension, you are making money for yourself from zero naira”.
The convener of the summit, Afolabi Olayinka, while welcoming participants described the event as a “summit for exploration of entrepreneurial opportunities in our various environment”. While admitting that the economy of the country was not yet fully back on track, he said many people, particularly, among the youth were still making headways and breaking new grounds.
He said, “It is imperative to establish that every economy is driven by three primary markets: product, labor, and capital and Institutional voids can be found in any or all of these markets in developing countries. Simply defined institutional voids are needs/service satisfaction gaps in a market. Hence, for a smart and sensitive individual, the key is to identify such void, and thus propound an opportunity for entrepreneurial intervention.
“Therefore this is the wakeup call that this conference seeks to champion. The cogent question before every participant in this summit is to honestly ask ourselves this fundamental question-In what aspect of the economy can I proffer entrepreneurial intervention. Do I have the basic set skills; do I even have the basic information required for formulation of effective strategy. How do I kick off my idea? Has someone been though this lane before? It will be detrimental to fall under the illusion of generalisation, people are still breaking new frontiers and getting rewarded for such.
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