Members of the Kwara State House of Assembly are taking time off their legislative duties to till the soil. They have accessed N40 million loan from the state government to cultivate soya beans and maize spread over 300 hectares of land in Agogo, Ejidongari district, Moro Local Government Area of the state. The lawmakers took the advantage of the N1 billion agriculture loan released to the state government by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The assemblymen have therefore admonished other state Houses of Assembly to take a cue from them as an antidote to current economic hardship in the land.
Conducting reporters round the farm-site, Speaker of the state House of Assembly Dr Ali Ahmad said: “Our visit today is symbolic. Seeing is believing. We have been saying that we have a farm. We chose a day that we are supposed to be sitting to visit this place, so that when the public wonders why we are not sitting, we want to create awareness that we are here today.
We incorporated a company, called Dodo Integrated Farms Nigeria limited. It has a board of trustees. It is clearly commercial and purely non-governmental. The shareholders are the 24 members of the Kwara state House of Assembly.
“We took advantage of N1billion loan from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for farmers through the state government. We accessed N40 million from that loan. Every member of the House is entitled to about N1.5 million. Once we pay back the N40 million, this farms of 300
hectares the conservative amount we expect from the sales of the produce is N300 million. So N40 million for N300 million. This is an example for our youths and farmers to have the opportunity to contribute their quota.
“It is an opportunity for action. We need everybody to go into farming. That is what we are showcasing. If every state will do this that we are doing, the complaints of hardship will be less. I recommend this initiative to all state Houses of Assembly in the country.”
“Supposing we decided to bring heavy duty equipment to this farms, we would have cleared this land with over N25 million. But with prudent management, we made use of tractors and manual labour for the clearing. We are going to use 30 hectares for maize production, but chunk of the land we have used for soya beans production.”
Dr Ahmad urged the electorate not vote for council candidates without good agriculture plans in the November, 2017 council election in the state.
He also charged local government chairmen and workers in the country to do more in practical agricultural practices to discourage idleness and boost food security.
He said, “Local government election is coming in the state. Ask anyone contesting for chairmanship position what he plans to do with HOD farm, agric and about 100 supervisors for agric, and staff going to local government councils to sit down and lazy away. We have been blaming federal, state governments, the NLC in charge of labour should rise up.
“Kwara should challenge incoming local government chairmen what they want to do. Each local government can have about 300 to 500 hectares of farmland to cultivate. See us. We are only 24, and there are many of them in local government councils. They can easily pay workers salary from the proceeds of the agricultural activities. This is an opportunity for action and not lamentation of cash crunch. If they are not interested in farming, they should not vote for them.”