Agriculture

Governor Abdulrasaq’s quest to enhance food security after COVID-19 pandemic

IT is not restricted to Kwara alone, the ravage of the coronavirus pandemic is a universal calamity. Many lives have been lost and truly, the entire home of man is still battling with the effects of this deadly disease.

The world has been having it tough and appalling. Indeed, many survivors are still writhing in pain. The virus came, destroyed and left to mankind fear, despair, hunger and economic devastation.

One thing that the poor and vulnerable still live with on a tremendous weight is abject hunger, coupled with heavy economic crush.

It is against this backdrop that Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq AbdulRazaq comes to the aid of the vulnerable and poor through an agricultural panacea.

The scheme is an agricultural intervention centred on recovery, recovery from the loss imposed by the COVID-19 plague.

In the messianic posture of Nigeria Covid-19 Action Recovery and Economic Stimulus (NG-CARES), here is a shower of benisons for the poor and vulnerable. In this mission of giving stimulus to those that have been affected by the coronavirus ravage (Note that only the poor and vulnerable are concerned), here is an operational convergence of both the State and the Federal Governments.

The NG-CARES project is an initiative that will be funded via the loan secured from the World Bank by the State Governors across the country. This programme, which is an embodiment of different platforms comprising Fadama, LIPW, KWCSDA, Social Cash Transfer and SMEs, is initiated to address the attendant misfortunes brought to the poor and vulnerable by coronavirus.

Particularly, there is something special about the Fadama wing of the NG-CARES initiative. Here, we are talking about using the agricultural arsenal to intervene in the lives of the poor, the vulnerable, women and youths. As it is also reflective in the other arms of the CARES project, the administration of Mallam AbdulRaham AbdulRazaq, with every sense of diligence and conscientiousness, is taking the bull by the horns to ameliorate the agony inherited by the victims of the pandemic through the agricultural intervention strategy of Fadama NG-CARES known as “Result Area2”, committed to increasing food security and safe functioning of food supply chains. The first advantage of this project is to give the beneficiaries a kind of relief by helping revamp their status. On the other hand, there are considerable tendencies that the programme, after being properly and consciously implemented, will elevate the pace of food production in the State. Interestingly, the project, which has two years as its life span, will capture 19, 695 beneficiaries in Kwara State.

Preparation for the project started with the resumption of the PIU officers drawn from different ministries in the State.

Evidence of the Kwara State’s commitment to the Result Area2 project won people’s conviction when Governor Abdulrazaq released fund to carry out preparatory activities for the programme. Knowing that these activities will serve as a fulcrum for effective implementation of the project, the Governor made that step to assure the people of the State that “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.”

Afterwards, members of the Project Implementation Unit (PIU) started touring the Sixteen Local Government Areas in the State on the 28th of June, 2021, the tour came to an end on the 8th of July, 2021. The tour enabled the team the opportunity to sensitise and educate local council officials, HODs (Agric), Local Fadama Desk Officers, Local Facilitators and representatives of LFAs (Local Famers’ Assocoiations). In every Local Government Area, the overview of the Fadama NG-CARES project was presented, and the necessary questions posed were answered to the satisfaction of the hosts. The State Project Coordinator, Dr. Busari Toyin, specifically harped on the objectives behind the project and the eligibility criteria. He noted that such was necessary to discourage those who are not qualified from registration, since the Government is only targeting the poor and vulnerable.

Alongside the sensitisation mission, the State Coordinator endeavoured to have a session with Governnor AbdulRazaq’s Aides on the 8th of July, 2021, and brief the latter on the project overview. The Aids were Technical Assistant on Agriculture, Senior Special Assistants on Job Creation, Non-Governmental and Youth Engagement.

The said fund was also used to equip staff’s offices, repair two (2 Nos.) decrepit Hilux Vehicles, overhaul 1 No. 30 KVA Diesel Generator, rehabilitate three (3 No.) blocks of office accommodation, take care of maintenance and operations of offices and some other commitments. Equipment of the offices, procurement of staff furniture, sensitisation/advocacy and others, will serve as a fulcrum for effective implementation of the project. The Governor took that step to assure the people of the State that “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.”

As a project that must be delivered according to the World Bank’s standard, the office is ensuring that the ideal practice, which will set it free from sullying reputation, is being observed at every point of implementation. In the meantime, the Project Implementation Team led by the State Project Coordinator, visited and opened collaboration with the Kwara State Public Procurement Agency on the 13th of August, 2021. The interaction between the two agencies sealed a deal on institutionalisation of the procurement guidelines regarding the implementation of the Fadama NG/CARES Project.

On a specific note, the office came up with the proposal to start with livestock (both inputs and assets) farming since the season could no longer accommodate crop farming in that year. To this effect, Three Thousand livestock farmers were initially pencilled to benefit from the first phase of the project disbursement. To achieve this successfully, some exercises must first be conducted. Responding to this proposal, the Governor released another fund. The fund came like rain helping the plant to bud. Interestingly, this was to carry out the screening, validation and selection of the Phase One of the beneficiaries targeting 3000 farmers within the first six months of the programme.

On the 2nd of November, 2021, Facilitators and Local Desk Officers were trained. The training session was in preparation for the screening exercise of the potential beneficiaries. In his opening remark at the training session, the Coordinator noted that the training was necessary to gird the participants particularly on physical screening, verification and geo-tagging; safeguard (fieldwork and safeguard screening form); Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and Public Service Rules before the exercise commenced.

Another shower came in the mode of surprise as Governor Abdulrazaq approved additional 3,000 beneficiaries in the crop farming enterprise. With this complement, the number of the farmers (both in livestock and crop farming) in the first phase of disbursement of the Kwara Fadama NG-CARES now totals 6000.

Generally, the NG-CARES Project is to be executed through the money secured from the World Bank, part of the imperatives involved as implementation qualification is to meet up with necessary conditions which include payment of the counterpart fund by the executive of the beneficiary state. In this regards, Kwara State came out as one of the few states certified (after a thorough assessment) by the Federal CARES Support Unit to be ready for effective implementation of the project and disbursement.

To demonstrate how meticulous the implementation process of the project is, the Kwara State Fadama NG-CARES Delivery Platform on 20th and 22nd of April held another training session with Community Facilitators and Local Fadama Desk Officers in respect of the committees of the various Farmer Communities’ Associations, particularly on how the committees – Management; Procurement/Maintenance; Monitoring and Evaluation; and Environmental and Conflict Resolution – will be administered effectively. The training was designed to be replicated by the trainees in their respective LGAs.

During the training, the State Coordinator revealed the governor’s passion for the project, saying that, “This is a clear pointer to progress as far as the project of Fadama NG-CARES in Kwara is concerned. Governor Abdulrazaq deserves commendation for usual swift response to the imperative needs of the delivery platform every time. Kwara is one of the few states leading in the project out of the thirty-six states of the Federation.

This is a good way Governor Abdulrazaq will say there is no cause for alarm. It is now time for the poor and vulnerable in the state to rejoice because the Governor is in charge to drive away hunger, ans tackle poverty by enhancing food security after the damage made by the covid-19 pandemic.