The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security has commenced the 2023/24 dry season farming to boost production and enhance national food security.
The irrigation project targets 200,000 to 250, 000 hectares of arable land, which is projected to produce 1.25 million tons of wheat. Unveiling the irrigation scheme in Gashua, Yobe state, at the weekend, the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari said: “Today’s farming event is a response to President Bola Tinubu’s declaration of emergency on national food security. The national irrigation farming is being implemented under the Agricultural Growth Scheme and Agro Pocket (NAGS-AP) project.”
In Yobe, he said, the dry-season farming would take off in the Kumadugu/Yobe and Wachakal River Basins, including the Nguru wetlands. Besides, the minister said the distributed farm inputs, comprising assorted fertilizers, improved seeds, and pesticides, have been subsidized by the federal government to the tune of 50 per cent.
“The farm inputs have been delivered for distribution to farmers in the state. Each of them will receive seven bags of NPK and liquid fertilizers, two bags of improved wheat seeds and litres of pesticide, depending on the size of arable land to be irrigated to produce wheat.
“A monitoring implementation team has been set up in each of the wheat-producing states,” he said, stating that activities include evaluation from land preparation to the harvests of crops produced in the various river basins of states.
Responding on behalf of other farmers, Isa Mai Unguwa lamented that despite the production of 3,000 bags of rice yearly, he had never benefited from the federal and state government’s subsidised farm inputs.
