The All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN) has commenced Seyi Makinde, governor of Oyo State over what they described as his strides, initiatives, and support in the agricultural sector.
This comes after the state government organised training programmes for 22,370 farmers on weather predictions, soil management and other factors that affect agricultural practice.
Mr. Adewumi Abass, the Oyo State chapter chairman of AFAN, gave the commendation after a programme organised by the state government to present the seasonal climate predictions released by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet).
At the programme held at the House of Chiefs, Secretariat, Ibadan, Abass said the training was important and useful as it would help farmers to understand their environment and how best to handle their farming activities.
“It will empower us with the knowledge of what to plant and the kind of animals we can rear and what we can plant at a particular period across the state,” he said. “Our business has more to do with ecology and with the way the weather is nowadays, with the rain stopping at intervals, nobody is sure of rainfall pattern anymore.
The Oyo State Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, Olasunkanmi Olaleye, said the government put the programme together to present NiMet’s predictions to farmers to guide them on the planting season and what to expect in climatic conditions.
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He added that the Ministry also presented the result of the soil test it embarked upon in 100 communities across the state, noting that the state government had, in the process of conducting the soil test , also trained over 22,000 on how to respond to the result of the soil test.
He said: “What we are doing today are two main things. We are presenting seasonal climate predictions as released by NiMET and as it affects Oyo State in the year 2025 to the farmers, so they can know when to start planting.
“Also, they will know when to expect drought and the things they need to do, especially as regards the climatic condition that we may have this year – whether they need to plant drought-resistant crops, where they need to apply irrigation, the time of the year they need to plant and what are the things they can plant in the year.
“All of these are for us to achieve increased yields in Oyo State in 2025.
Speaking during the programme, a Lead Scientist with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Professor Morufat Balogun, said the predictions by NiMet are reliable, as according to her, those of 2024 were 95 per cent accurate.
“NiMeT has tried to make reliable predictions which, as of last year, were 95 per cent reliable. So, we can work with NiMeT, which has discovered that in the southern part of the country, we will have a longer growing season in the first part of the year and a shorter one in the second season and the latter part of the year.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
