BY SANI ALIYU,Zaria
The emir of Saminaka in Kaduna State, Alh. Ibrahim Sani has declared that U-Farm Africa’s Tractor for Grains Initiative is a catalyst to building capacity and improving the productivity of smallholder farmers.
He stated this while flagging off and commissioning the Tractors hiring scheme by U-Farm Africa at Sabon Birni District, Saminaka Zone, Lere Local Government of Kaduna State.
Alhaji Ibrahim Sani said this development will assist the smallholder farmers in improving their productivity at the end of the farming season.The Emir urged the beneficiaries of the scheme to be sincere and pay back their dues in due time.
He commended U-Farm Africa for this laudable initiative towards improving and encouraging smallholder farmers in maximizing their outputs and reducing post harvest losses.
The Emir assured the company of the support of traditional institutions in Lere Local Government towards achieving their goals on agricultural development among the small holder farmers in Nigeria.
In his remarks, the Country Lead Manager of U-Farm Africa, Mr.Olalekan Ilori said the targeted beneficiaries of this initiative are the small holder farmers because they are germane in ensuring food security in Nigeria, Africa and the world at large.
He said the objective is not to sell the tractors, power tillers and other machinery but to make them accessible for smallholder farmers at reasonable prices as well as providing flexible means of payments for them.
According to him, if smallholder farmers embrace this technological innovation of farmers’ empowerment, yields will be increased and post harvest losses will be reduced drastically.
Mr. Ilori also stated that they are in partnership with Micromec (a subsidiary of Crop Doctor) who are the manufacturers of these farm machinery intentionally designed to meet the need of the smallholder farmers, providing affordable hiring prices at reasonable costs
On the mode of payment, Mr Ilori said a farmer can choose to pay for the services rendered on his farm with cash or pay with grains after his harvest, given that he makes an initial payment of 20% of the money charged while the balance is to be settled after the harvest in grains. U-Farm Africa will then mop these grains and supply to animal feed producing companies, hence the entire agricultural value chain is serviced.
The mechanized inputs are tractors, power tillers, threshers, Solar powered Knapsack sprayers and harvesters
Importantly, while U-Farm Africa is targeting a global reach, the Lere, Soba and Kachia Local governments of Kaduna State are the pilots of this initiative.
Some of the farmers were interviewed. Rabi Isah and Ezekiel Joshua expressed their enthusiasm at the dynamism of farmers capacity building that U-Farm Africa has brought to their domain.
While stating that this form of mechanized input provision is the first of its kind, they commended U-Farm Africa for choosing Saminaka as pilot of this great initiative.
