For three days, a member of the House of Representatives representing Ohaozara/Onicha/Ivo in Ebonyi State, Linus Okorie has engaged over 2000 farmers in his constituency in an enlightenment and empowerment campaign on the importance of growing Vitamin A fortified cassava and maize.
It was not the first time Okorie brought the local farmers together at a seminar or workshop setting to educate them on modern trends of agriculture. Some months back, he assembled them at Obiozara to engage them on the need for forming cooperative societies, giving them insights of how they could use such groups to attract incentives and do business with their farming.
The latest gathering was centered on taking agriculture very seriously and the benefits of cultivating Vitamin A fortified cassava and maize among other uses.
To achieve his objective, Okorie, who is the chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Agricultural Colleges and Institutions, hired HarvestPlus, an agricultural group that breeds crops for better nutrition, which is being coordinated by the Centre for International Tropical Agriculture and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), to perform the enlightenment and empowerment programme.
Not only were the farmers in the three local governments educated on the need and how to grow Vitamin A food crops, but the seeds were also handed out to them to grow right away. They were also taught how to process the Vitamin A cassava into different value-added products such as using cassava to make chips, moi-moi, custard and even tea.
At the opening ceremony in Ishiagu Civic centre of Ivo local government, Okorie noted that cassava is a staple in Nigeria, consumed daily by more than 100 million people but that while the commonly available white cassava can provide most of the body’s daily energy requirements, it lacks micro-nutrients, such as vitamin A, that are essential for a healthy and productive life.
He told his people that Vitamin A deficiency can impair the body’s immunity from infectious diseases and causes eye damage, even lead to blindness or death.
He added that nearly one in three Nigerian children under five and one-quarter of all pregnant women in the country are vitamin A deficient.
He said that most Nigerians do not get enough micronutrients such as vitamin A, zinc, and iron required to lead healthy productive lives from the foods that they eat, noting also that micronutrient deficiencies can lower IQ, cause stunting and blindness in children, lower resistance to disease in both children and adults, and increase risks for both mothers
and infants during childbirth.
“It is estimated that about 1 million of the 3 million child deaths that occur each year as a result of undernutrition are due to hidden hunger. Biofortified crops which have been bred to have higher amounts of micro-nutrients, can help provide these needed vitamins and minerals. They can be effective in reducing hidden hunger as part of a strategy that includes dietary diversification, supplementation, and commercial fortification, among others,” said Okorie
He stated that the way forward was to ensure that farmers do not suffer the usual glut that has continually resulted from resurgent production of cassava over the years, adding that all participants in the workshops shall also be uploaded unto the Harvestplus e-market platform, which will integrate the participants into an anchor Programme of out growers to be
supported by funding from single-digit interest rate funds from the Central bank of Nigeria (CBN), Bank of Agriculture (BoA) and related windows.
The Program’s technical partner and Country Manager of HarvestPlus inNigeria, Dr. Paul Ilona, who grilled the participating farmers throughout the three days in the different venues, told the rural farmers that though the cassava stems he brought came from Oyo state, but that after the program, the cassava stems would henceforth be sourced from Ebonyi state.
Ilona cited the uses of Moringa tree which he said is powered by Vitamin A to buttress his to the farmers.
“Hon. Okorie wants us to leave well and that is why he is doing the programme. Vitamin A is crucial to our living. The important thing is to eat nutritional food,” he stated.
The Harvestplus boss explained the uses of the vitamin A Cassava in making chips, biscuits, bread, flour, Fofo, tea, among other derivatives. He noted that use of crude implements for farming will soon be over in Ebonyi state and will be replaced with mechanical farming. “A farmer is a businessman and should be conscious of that,” he said.
Ilona taught them basic techniques of farming and planting the cassava for bumper harvest such as spaces to give whiling planting, how to sow the stems and maintain it till maturity. He encouraged them to embrace business farming since every farm crop has value added bye products, whether in cassava, Maize, Rice or palm produce.
At the end, the farmers nicknamed the new breed crop as “Linus Cassava.” The participants lauded the effort Rep. Okorie for opening their eyes into the benefits of hybrid Vitamin A fortified Cassava and Maize. They agreed they were well educated on new techniques of farming, taking farming as serious business and have been revealed to the nutritional values of
Vitamin A cassava and maize just like they learnt the derivatives of the crops.
One of the participants, Mrs. Mary Okonkwo from Amagu-Ishiagu, Ivo local government area said: “I learnt how to plant cassava and maize. I will do my next planting according the way we have been thought particularly on the method of planting the cassava stem for better growth. There is difference on how we used to plant the cassava and how we have been taught to plant it now. Before, we used to plant more than four stems of cassava on one heap but we have been told to space the stems and reduce the number per heap for better yield.
“Also we have been taught how to use the Vitamin A cassava to make flour, chips and all that, we are grateful. I thank Hon Linus Okorie because this is development and a new thing for us. This is something we didn’t known but he brought experts to teach us these modern techniques in farming and doing business with farm produce, we are happy and may God Almighty bless him.”
Another participant, Orji Anyim said, “I learnt many useful things like the process of transforming a subsistence farmer to a rich grower.”
