6,000 Kano Wheat Farmers Get FG’s Intervention

By Abdullahi Yusuf

The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security has distributed agriculture inputs to 6,000 wheat farmers in Kano State, as part of the Federal Government’s efforts to boost food security in the country.

Under the intervention, each farmer, especially the smallholder farmer, was given three bags of fertilizers and one 50-kilogram bag of wheat seeds, across 12 special cluster centres in the state.

The distribution exercise was launched at Alkamawa in Bunkure Local Government Area of the state on Thursday.

Launching the exercise, the State Coordinator, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, Kano, Isa Isiyaku Hotoro, said it was a special programme “to capture smallholder farmers, medium and large scale farmers in wheat production.”

Hotoro said the programme was aimed at boosting the wheat farmers’s productivity and the nation’s “food basket.”

He said the programme is covering 3,000 hectares in the 12 special clusters in Alkamawa in Bunkure Local Government Area, as well as in Ajingi, Gaya and Garko local government areas.

He said the inputs were given to the farmers at a 75 per cent subsidy by the Federal Government, while the farmers would pay 25 per cent of the cost of the inputs i.e. N111,000.

In his remarks at the occasion, the Chairman of the Gaya Emirate Farmers Association, Alhaji Yakubu Ibrahim, commended the Federal Government for the intervention which he said would boost wheat production in the state.

“Before the coming of this support, many of us had reduced production due to high prices of fuel and fertilizers, but with this intervention, we would resume our normal wheat farming activities,” Ibrahim said.