The Oyo State government says it has successfully trained 22,370 farmers on weather predictions, soil management and other factors that affect agricultural practice.
This is coming as Seyi Makinde, the state governor, received accolades from All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Oyo State chapter.
Speaking after a programme organised by the state government to present the seasonal climate predictions as released by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), Adewumi Abass, chairman, AFAN, Oyo State chapter said that the training was important and quite useful, as it would help farmers to understand their environment and how best to handle their farming activities.
“We are happy that the Governor Makinde-led government is organising this kind of training for farmers. It will give us the knowledge of how the ecology of our environment is; 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.
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Also speaking, Olasunkanmi Olaleye, Oyo State Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, said that the government put the programme together to present NiMet’s predictions to farmers in order to guide them on the planting season and what to expect on climatic conditions.
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 test, also trained over 22,000 on how to respond to the result of the soil test.
“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,” he said.
Morufat Balogun, professor and a lead scientist with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), speaking during the programme, said that the predictions by NiMet are reliable, as according to her, those of 2024 were 95 percent accurate.
Story was adapted from Business Day.
