The Niger State Governor, Umaru Bago, has launched the distribution and sale of fertilizer and other farm inputs subsidized at a 50 percent rate for the 2024 planting season in the state in order to ensure food security across the state.
The Governor, during the flag-off at the farm center in Tunga, reiterated the commitment of his administration to prioritizing agriculture, investing in machinery and technology to boost productivity, achieving sustainable food security, reducing food costs, and addressing unemployment.
Bago pointed out that the exercise of the 50 percent subsidy is to ensure affordability in supporting farmers for the 2024 farming season and beyond, adding that it’s in line with the ambitious New Niger Agenda of his administration towards achieving sustainable food security, reducing food costs, and addressing unemployment.
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On his own, the State Commissioner for the Ministry for Agriculture and Food Security, Musa Salihu Bawa Bosso, pointed out that the state, in prioritizing the implementation of the directive of cultivating 10,000 hectares of land in each of the 25 local government areas, is working with Niger Food to actualize the dream.
Bawa Bosso urged the governor to support the resuscitation of the state’s buffer stock program, which has been on the comatose for several years, so as to ensure easy purchase of stock for sale at subsidized rates when necessary.
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According to the commissioner, the Niger State’s Agricultural and Mechanization Development Authority (NAMDA) is working in collaboration with Niger Food to address the needs of 20,000 smallholder farmers and 10,000 mediumholders, who have access to 1,000 power tillers and agro-inputs, to promote commercial agriculture in the state.