Chief Afe Babalola (SAN), the elder statesman and founder of Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti, ABUAD, urged Nigerians, regardless of profession or status, to embrace farming in order for the country to make a meaningful impact in developing alternative economic reliance.
Babalola made this call at the closing ceremony of the 2022 edition of the annual “Afe Babalola Agricultural Expo” (ABA-EX) and Youth Development, saying he introduced the initiative to return the sector to its rightful place as one of the best solutions to the country’s myriads of problems.
Babalola awarded cash gifts to 81 best-performing farmers, made up of five farmers in each of the 16 local government areas of Ekiti. The best farmer from each LGA got a cash sum of N200,000, second, N150,000, third, N100,000, fourth, N75,000; and fifth, N50,000; while the overall best farmer across the state got the star prize of N2 million.
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The youth empowerment angle of the annual awards includes the provision of farm kits for several jobless youths totaling N34 million, as youths went home with free smoking clean equipment for the smoking of fish.
The legal luminary recalled that he developed an interest in farming while in primary school, adding that he has been involved in all-round agriculture from the days of his youth and that he is still farming till today in spite of all that God has enabled him to attain.
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“That is what I expect all Nigerians to do, no matter what you are or who you are. You just have to be involved in farming. If we all did, you can imagine how many farmlands we would have had by now.
“Every family wants to be great, yet we are not involved in agriculture. We live in a nation where we produce less and consume more. Things don’t work like that, except we are waiting for a calamity to happen. In fact, we are already in a calamity, “he said.
