FG Agriculture Farm Input Distribution in Lagos Benefits over 4000 Farmers

Precious Ugwuzor

Over 4000 farmers in Lagos State whose farmlands/ crops were affected by 2020 Flood disasters in the state will benefit from the direct distribution of the federal government’s agricultural farm inputs to farmers.

The Commissioner for Agriculture, Lagos State, Miss Abisola Ruth Olusanya, made this disclosure during the flag off of the distribution of farm inputs at the state Ministry of Agriculture Farm Centre in Oko Oba, Agege.

According to her, the federal government through the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) in response to the incidence of flood experienced across the country in 2020 has provided assistance to famers and farms affected in order to reduce the effect on their livelihood.

She explained that the items to be given to each farmer include Fertilizers, Growth Enhancers, Herbicides, Pesticides, Knapsack sprayers, water pump and seeds.

“Physical enumeration and verification of the affected farmers was carried out in the state earlier between 24th June and 28th June 2021. This verification was carried out by a joint team of federal and state agencies to ensure transparency.

“4,354 farmers were identified from this exercise consisting 2,085 maize farmers, 1,550 cassava farmers and 719 rice farmers.

“It is my belief that the little gesture from the Federal government will go a long way in bringing some succour to the affected farmers and in the long run and help to mitigate against food shortage as a result of the flood incidence”, she added.

Abisola reiterated the commitment of the Lagos State government to continue to support agricultural value actors across the state.

The Director-General of the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, Dr. Olufemi Oke-Osanyintolu commended the Lagos State Governor, His Excellency Babajide Sanwo-Olu, for giving agriculture the desired attention to ensure food security which is important to the well being of the people in Lagos State.

” The farmers are well taken care of in terms of data collection and all the data are with the Lagos state ministry of agriculture.

“We are doing a lot of things in terms of sensitisation and training. When I’m talking about building capacity, I’m talking about giving them equipment and giving them some funds, as well as encouraging them to be in a sort of cooperative.

“We are handling the cooperative society in another form which means, they have data collections, they have clear association,we interact with them, we have officers that visit them and we will make sure that we document all these our intervention”, he added.

Also, Ibrahim Farinloye, the South-west Coordinator, National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said the volume of income has increased and “when you talk of farmland, the location of farmland, especially in Lagos State, you know most parts of Lagos State are under sea level so what we have in place is enlightenment.

“Lagos, few months ago never had anything about disaster risk reduction because reactions to disaster occurrence is not the best but now we are working together with Lagos state Emergency Management Agency and other agencies like State Ministry of Environment, State Ministry of Agriculture to see what we can do in reducing the frequent occurrence of various disasters.

” It’s more economical to reduce the disasters than to react to disasters because most of the disaster victims never recover from them. We are working towards integrating disaster risk production strategy in Lagos State.

“The pumping machine is meant to reduce and encourage dry season farming. We have record already of those farmers who have been affected so far this year. We are working with them and we are giving them encouragement and training on what to be done and not be done to reduce loss.”