Th e West Africa Agricultural Productivity Programme (WAAPP) has called on Nigerian farmers to ensure they maintain proper application of insecticides as farming season progresses. Th e National Coordinator, Dr. James Apochi, in a chat with Blueprint recently gave the charge, saying especially those trained by WAAPP should put their knowledge to practice to further boost the federal government food security strive. Apochi, said in a bid to promote environmentally responsive and health conscious use of pesticides in the country, WAAPP Nigeria had in 2013 took the initiative of forging eff ective partnership with all stakeholders such as the regulators, marketers and farmers in this share responsibility of pesticides regulation, registration and use in Nigeria.
“With WAAPP providing fi nancial support, the agencies have carried out various sensitisation activities, town hall meetings, seminars, workshops, and road shows in Kastina, Benue, Lagos, Osun and Gombe states involving over 1200 farmers across the locations. “We also provides pesticides application safety kits to 100 farmers in Benue and 150 participants in Katsina. Farmers training on pesticides application conducted also in Benue by the ministry of agriculture,” he said He said the programme also provided and distributed Information and educational materials and other documents to enhance farmers knowledge on general pesticides handling and application procedures. “We have also developed a comprehensive pest management plan for project which can be adopted by farmers and research institutions. “Another is the adoption of pest resistant crop varieties through the adopted villages and schools of the National Agricultural Research Institutes and collaborating universities across the country,” he said He stated further that proper compliance by farmers to all this process will greatly enhance Nigeria eff orts at achieving it zero reject plans.
