Shettima: Tinubu’s Agric Policy Will Ensure Maximisation of Under Cultivated Lands Across Nigeria
By Abubakar Audi, Minna
Vice Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Sen. Kashim Shettima, has said that his principal, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s agricultural policy as contained in his recently released manifesto will ensure double production in crop yields on all under cultivated lands across the country.
Shettima made this declaration yesterday, while speaking at a town hall meeting with stakeholders in the agro-allied sector in Minna, Niger State. The event had in attendance the APC flagbearer, Bola Tinubu who promised to support farmers in the country with schemes that will eminently revolutionalize agriculture in Nigeria.
He said while the gains of the great groundnut pyramids of the past remained, it was wrong to continue basking on its past glory given the place of technology and mechanisation in agriculture.
” Instead of building pyramids of grains, we are promising to double crop production on our arable lands. We can’t do this without offering you the machines and the financial support to compete with the world. Asiwaju has a designed and realistic blueprint for achieving this by partnering and engaging commodity boards to ease access to strategic crops at affordable prices.
“We are partnering with research, development and financial institutions on the implementation and financing of effective farming methods and promising to make available grain reserves of food storage facilities to support our farmers across the country. We shall also deploy technology to aid agriculture and sensitize our farmers so they can adjust to this change.
Kashim Shettima stated that there was a need for farmers to be equipped with the right market information, noting that this was indispensable in the quest for global participation in agricultural commodities exchange and trading.
” We are offering to empower small-scale farmers to embrace mechanised farming and guide them to explore our proposed agricultural extension programme and access market information to ensure bumper market yields. This is how we seek to support you from the point of cultivation in Kontagora to the point of sale in Vancouver in Canada. We, therefore, plead with you to partner with us to achieve this dream,” Shettima craved.
A large number of supporters had thronged out to welcome Tinubu to the State capital. The host governor, Abubakar Sani Bello and the director general of the PCC, Simon Lalong were among those who earlier welcomed participants at the event.
