Following the payment of the National Fadama III Counterpart Fund by the Rivers State Government as part of successes made by the Chibuike Amaechi-led administration in Agriculture in the year 2009, the State Fadama III Co-ordinating office has disbursed the sum of N17.2 million to 25 farmer groups in the state.
The state Fadama co-ordinator, Mr. Kingsley Amadi, disclosed this in an interview with The Tide in his office at Rumuodomaya in Obio/Akpor local government area of Rivers State.
According to him, Fadama project is counterpart fund dependent, which implies that for any group, state, local government and community to benefit, it must pay its share of the counterpart fund, saying that over the years, non-payment of project counterpart fund has denied indigenes of this state a lot of benefits from both federal government and the World Bank.
He said that the World Bank in 2009 approved and released the sum of USD 250 million for funding of Fadama III in the 36 states including the Federal Capital Territory, out of which Rivers State was allocated the sum of USD 7.85 million, meaning that the project will inject the sum of over N1.2 billion into the state for the funding of agricultural activities in both the up and downstream sectors.
The co-ordinator noted that with the payment of the 2008/2009 counterpart fund by the state government which qualifies the state to benefit, the World Bank released the initial deposit of $600, 000 for disbursement to farmers in the state.
The fund according to him is expected to assist the state government alleviate poverty, increase food production and tackle the problem of unemployment and youth restiveness, adding that, the project will provide grants to finance capacity building, advisory services, input support, acquisition of productive assets to farmers, as well as rural infrastructure, such as roads, markets, culverts and small bridges. It will also support adaptive research and on-farm trials that will meet the needs of the farmers, he noted.
In fulfillment of these objectives the state co-ordination office has embarked on the grading of a 4.5 kilometer access road in Barako and a market in Deiiyoro, Gokana Local Government Area of Rivers State at the cost of N1.2 million, arrangement has also been concluded to grade another road at Ogbakiri in Emohua local government area, at the cost of N1.4 million as well as propose N1.06 million borehol in Umudioga, cold room project in Abonnema, Akuku-Toru LGA and training of Farmers Community based procurement, Amadi maintained.
Inspite of numerous achievements made in 2009, the state coordinator said the office was confronted with the challenges of the failure of some local government councils to pay counterpart fund of N2 million only to qualify them participate in the project, the inability of beneficiaries to pay the beneficiary contributions to enhance their disbursement and lack of mobility to monitor ongoing projects.