FG to establish agric equipment hiring centres

This was revealed yesterday in an address by the agriculture minister, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, who represented President Goodluck Jonathan at the opening ceremony of the 7th National Agricultural Show at Tudun Wada in Karu Local Government Area of Nasarawa State.The minister said: “We are addressing the challenge of mechanization, with the establishment of 80 agricultural […]

This was revealed yesterday in an address by the agriculture minister, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, who represented President Goodluck Jonathan at the opening ceremony of the 7th National Agricultural Show at Tudun Wada in Karu Local Government Area of Nasarawa State.
The minister said: “We are addressing the challenge of mechanization, with the establishment of 80 agricultural equipment hiring centres across the country, with 90% financing from the Federal Ministry of Agriculture.”
“The equipment centres will be run by the private sector, and will have full sets of agricultural equipment, with over 400 tractors and mechanized harvesters. We will support farmers with subsidized electronic coupons to allow them to lease these agricultural equipment.”
This intervention, Dr. Adesina said, will go a long way in reducing the drudgery of farming and speed up the mechanization of agriculture.
The minister noted that the success of the agricultural transformation agenda is galvanizing global development finance institutions to support Nigeria.
“So far, about $2 billion has been committed by the World Bank, Africa Development Bank, IFAD and others in support of the agricultural transformation agenda”, he said.
Dr. Adesina also said that government is developing new staple crop processing zones supported by infrastructure that will attract the private sector to set up food processing facilities in the rural areas.