Farmer Tasks Govt On Grassroots Food Production

In order to boost massive food production at the grassroots level, a farmer Prince Kikpoye Ukwu has advocated an aggressive approach by all tiers of government in the country.

Prince Ukwu, from Amalem in the Abua/Odual Local Government Area of Rivers State who spoke to our special correspondent over the weekend at his farm site explained that to make the system work, the rural farmers should be funded directly.

“The grassroots food based production programme should be a scheme whereby the rural farmers in the country are directly funded by government in partnership with the ideals of the MDGs.

He called on the thirty six states governments in the country to set aside a certain percentage of their annual receipts from their federation allocation to enable them fund the rural farmers.

Apart from that, the various councils should have an inventory of genuine farmers in their zones so that when fully operational, only genuine farmers would have access to such funds.

While appreciating the efforts of some state governments in the country especially Rivers towards improving the agricultural sector, Prince Ukwu appealed to the various agricultural agencies to intensity efforts at enlightening the rural farmers in modern farming methods.

On the possibility of chairmen keying into such venture, Prince Ukwu explained that since they were the representative of the people, any action seen to positively affect their economic wellbeing should not be denied them.

He said if most of the chairmen according to reports have their own farms, then they have no moral right to deny the rural people such benefits.

“I know most of the chairmen have their own farms, therefore it behoves them to support such venture, afterall the money they have invested on their own farms cannot be compared to what it is expected for them to bring” he stated.