Abubarkar Bamai Musa is the newly appointed national coordinator of Nigeria Youth Farmers Network. In this interview with ENE OSHABA, this indigene of Yobe state who has been a member of the network since 2014 expresses the organisation’s commitment to encouraging young Nigerians to explore opportunities in agriculture.
How would this network encourage youths to embrace agriculture amidst clashes between farmers and cattle breeders?
There are lots of challenges in the agricultural sector which make young people not to be fully involved. This is because they look at agriculture as a venture for retirees to come and invest in after their service years and as a second alternative, that is why we don’t have a lot of innovations and educated people involved in the sector. I believe education is very important and creating a lot of awareness between them (herders and farmers) is very important. If you are a farmer, it doesn’t mean you (herders) would use your animals to feed on my farm and that there must be innovations and modern ways of tackling all these issues. If you look at the percentage population of people that practise farming in Nigeria, you’ll find out that 40-45 percent of them are youth from rural areas.
Do you think education is necessary in agricultural business?
Most youths in the rural areas don’t have access to formal education, modern agriculture or capacity building and technicalities. This is why the Nigerian Young Farmers Network would create programmes and activities want to improve modern agricultural development. On the other hand, the Fulani’s don’t have any opportunity for capacity building and advanced technologies towards how they can manage and compose themselves and by that show them that what they are doing is wrong. Being in this office, this is part of the critical situation I am looking into and would consult a lot of stakeholders and consultants to see how we can bring a blueprint or framework to reduce all these activities in this country which have to go in a modern way.
Does the network has plans towards ensuring that security, insurance and assurance cover farmers and their produce in case of any attack and damage?
Definitely we have issue of insecurity in this country. I have a colleague of mine that I told you had a farm recently in the north western part of the country. After the harvest, they (bandits) set fire on the farm. It raised a lot of alarm. It seems this country is at war because of insecurity and food security.
We need to notify our security agencies on this critical issue. They are doing well but they have to improve to make this country a better place for the young people to practice agriculture.
What other priorities are you bringing on board in the shortest period of time to benefit the youths?
We are looking at the complete chain not only farming. We have to look at the processing itself, after processing, the off-taking. Most of our people are farmers; so, we have to look at various channels. I know Nigeria gives priority to rice and maize cultivation; we would also look at farmers that produce tomatoes, some are into oranges and beans farming etc.
Unfortunately, you’ll find out that preservation has been a big issue for them despite the huge investment. Let’s look at Benue state for example, you’ll find out that someone have a lot of oranges but there’s no processing company down there. So, we have to look for investors to come and invest in those areas which would help in the employment of youths down there. After this, we would bring a lot of investors from within and outside the country to come and invest and call their attention to the presence of such markets in Nigeria.
Secondly if you look at the tomatoes processing company from Katsina, someone would take a truck of tomatoes to Lagos and become stranded in selling them down there. So in our localities, we would need a mini processing company that would help in processing tomatoes there. This would help a lot of people and eradicate the unemployment we are facing in this country.
Thirdly, we are working with the research institute involved in seedlings and found out that this is the major key issue of farming in Nigeria. You find out that you waste a lot of time and resources and you don’t get the required yield which discourages a lot of people from going back to the farm. After this we want to see how we can get support to the youths. We have women involved too and I’m giving more priority to that to look at gender equality and inclusiveness.
That’s why we are looking at 1,2,5 and 8 of the sustainable development goals. We are looking at how to eradicate poverty, zero hunger, economic growth and wealth creation. So this is something I want to emphasise and focus on. We want the women to participate, not when you have to go to the farm. They can create small green houses and make money, mini fish ponds and poultry. That’s why we are going to have a dashboard on the platform to connect a farmer to the buyer. We are also looking at embracing a lot of technology.
For example, I saw someone on BBC that wasn’t educated but made a water pump machine. Let’s say we bring this guy and give him all the support, we won’t have to go to China and India to buy a water pump anymore. I still watched another documentary on BBC where someone invented an alarm device that notifies you when you need to water your plants. So imagine you have this technology in your greenhouse, you don’t need to stress yourself. These are the kinds of innovations we want to bring to the people. We are looking at the eco-system where everybody can participate. So with that, Nigerian Young Farmers Net-work has a lot to do with the young people of Nigeria. We believe we are the ones to turn the economic status of the country.
How achievable are your plans and what strategies would help bring the plans to reality?
Mr President is always calling the youths to participate in agriculture. If you look back then in Kano, they did the groundnut pyramids and all these people are youths; so we believe we can do far more better than them. We only need the opportunity and support and would make Nigeria proud.
