Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh who inaugurated the Committees for the implementation of the MoU between the Federal Government of Nigeria, participating state governments and CAMACO on Agricultural Mechanization System (AMS) in Abuja, stated that “This is a very important programme that has been on the drawing board. Nigeria is very low on tractors. There are less than 30,000 tractors in Nigeria and we should at least as at today have a million. This partnership with CAMACO is an attempt to catch up with our shortfalls in tractors and increase our mechanization to make it easier for agriculture to take place. Increased mechanization is even more important now that we are trying to encourage the youth to embrace agriculture.
“Some parts of the north are very dusty, so your air filters must be designed to fit appropriately. You must also build these tractors bearing in mind that we need them to last 15 to 20 years at the very least. We don’t have money to repeat purchases of machinery every two years. We need solid machinery, very well-designed machines to cope with the climatic conditions and the nature of our soil. We are also intending to keep after sales services in top gear.”
Participating state governments include: Zamfara, Adamawa, Jigawa, Ebonyi, Katsina, Niger, Taraba and Sokoto.
CAMACO is a venture funded by the China African Development Fund (CADFund) as a strategic partnership built and developed between China and Africa, with the purpose of encouraging and supporting Chinese enterprises to invest in Africa.
Furthermore, the Chinese government has gone ahead to loan Nigeria $4.5 billion to fund the purchase of appropriate farming tools to boost local agriculture. The move comes after President Muhammadu Buhari had paid a state visit to Chinese President Xi Jinping last year.
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