The Nigerian government has urged rice farmers in Niger state to practise dry season farming in order to mitigate the effects of the 2022 flooding that destroyed their farmlands and avert food shortages in the state and the country as a whole.
Dr Matthew Ahmed, Coordinator, Federal Government/International Fund for Agriculture Development, FG/IFAD, Value Chain Development Programme, VCDP, gave the advice during the training of farmers on Good Agronomic Practices on Dry Season Rice Production in Rabba, Mokwa LG.
He explained that the flood destroyed a lot of rice farms, hence the decision to aggressively train farmers in dry season farming to ensure higher productivity per hectare for food security in the state and the country.
The Niger coordinator of IFAD said,” this dry season farming is a massive one, we are pursuing it aggressively if we don’t do that, there is going to be a food shortage. This could lead to a lot of crisis as a result of the flood during rainy the season.”
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According to him, if the farmers apply the new knowledge they get from this training at the end of the production season farmers, they will be harvesting over 12 metric tons per hectare.
Some of the trainees across the four benefiting LGAs commended VCDP for the opportunity, describing it as a timely intervention to boost their harvest during the dry season to reduce hardship and cushion their losses due to flood disasters.
This story was adapted from Daily Post.
