BAAY Agro, Greenbles Empower Small Holder Cashew Farmers 

Private agribusiness farmers, BAAY Agro, and Greenbles, have partnered with the Cocoa Research Institute of Nigeria to plant five million seedlings in years ahead.
Launched in Iseyin, Oyo State, the partnership is to integrate over 5000 cashew small hold farmers to its plan by researching viable seedlings and making them available for trained farmers for free.
Director of cashew planning, Cocoa Research Institute of Nigeria (CRIN), Dr O.S Ibiremo, emphasised on the economical advantages of the value chain attributed to cashew and other perennial crops.
He stated how important farmers are to this value chain and how they have been short-changed due to lack of value addition, Ibiremo said established private firms should look in to local processing to help the farmers.
He stated the role of CRIN as a research institute that would partner in research and training support for women, having mentioned that over 75% of personnel in cashew processing are women.
Founder of Baay Agro, Segun Adegoke, expressed appreciation to the farmers for their support since 2021.
He also launched the BAAY AGENCY, a smart local liaison, for which it’s workers would be trained to use the smart application to further make the empowerment seamless over the next 10 years.
The Baay Agro boss also emphasised the long term goal, which is to have an integrated services.
He specifically stated the plan to partner with all stakeholders and government to bring a processing machine to Oyo State, which will in turn bring markets closer to the farmers.
He also said creating employment for the locals and fostering economical prosperity of the rural community which will be their contribution to food security campaign of the United Nations.
Saeed Oshin, CEO of Greenbles, awarded the smart farmers of the year amidst the locals and solicited for their continuous engagement in smart farming.
Some of the small holder farmers raised concern about planting, timelines to reach yield, market access, attacks amongst others.
“The farmers would, however, be supported yearly for the next five years in areas of seedlings, soil viability testing, trainings, farm inputs, market access, agribusiness information, mapping and farm data analysis using GIS,” Oshin said.