Agricultural Development intrinsically has direct proportionality to improving the rural economy and in some cases initiating prosperity in those rural communities.
About 79 million agricultural land is available in Nigeria and they are largely domiciled in the rural areas which have over 100 million in population in the year 2021 according to Macrotrends.
I have gone to many rural communities across various belts and agroecological zones in Nigeria in the last 12 years.
A common but sad observation almost immediately noticed is that over 80% of those areas operate in perpetual poverty and recession. The few ones that experience marginal development are in most cases championed by interventions with robust, sustainable approaches.
The interventions are barely enough to cause the required socio-economic reverberation that accompanies agricultural development, innovations, and research.
But as the days go by, it is imperative to note that the future of African agriculture and its attendant threats largely rely on how penetrating we are at implementing the needed transformation at these communities or grassroots as others may call it.
Those communities need to engage the innovations in agriculture through science and technology and so require quality education. They needed to stay healthy in their bodies and souls, hence they need standard health care.
They will constantly have to work on farms and other allied organizations and therefore require basic social amenities. They may have to transport the products to markets for the products to fully diffuse through the value chains hence infrastructural development like good roads, recreational facilities, and so on.
If these interventions are delivered comprehensively to at least half of the villages I have passed through in the last 12 years, we should by now be going positive on the growth in rural economic indices at least using those communities as a template for the larger society within that locality.
It is a tough call with its attendant resources but needed to put the nation on the pathway for shared prosperity.
This is the real deal…
It’s an example of going deep enough to build a noticeable skyscraper.
Written by Oyewole Okewole
Brief Profile.
Oyewole Okewole is an award-winning agro-industrial and project development specialist with over a decade’s experience with a special interest in the entire value chain of a wide range of tropically grown agricultural products. He is a graduate of Agricultural Engineering with a Master’s in Crop Processing and Storage Engineering and also has a mini-MBA in Business Administration and Management.
He is further trained in strategic foresight, sustainable food systems, dynamics of agribusiness, agro-industries, and project management.
He is an advocate of Sustainable Food Systems as it principally affects the Reduction of Poverty, Reduction of Hunger, Reduction of Post-harvest Losses, Food Security, Food Loss and Wastes.
He is the Team lead of Oakwall Agro-Industrial Consult and Services (OAICS); a professional enterprise he coordinates, a member of the Raise a Farmer Initiative (RAFI) team; a social enterprise organization, and he is also the Project Development and Operations Manager at Process Concepts and Technologies Limited.
He is an author and conference speaker.
Wole’s mission is to work with individuals and organizations to create value for their agribusiness, agro-industrial needs, and expectations.