The National Agricultural Land Development Authority (NALDA) has announced that President Mohammadu Buhari will on the 10th of November, 2020 flag off the National Young Farmers Scheme #backtofarm.
"Hello Nigerians, we are glad to let you know that on the 10th of November 2020, the President will flag-off the National Young Farmers Scheme, the time has finally come for us to go #backtofarm," NALDA stated in a tweet.
The National Young Farmers Scheme also known as the Buhari Young Farmers Network Program as part of the National Economic Sustainability Plan (NESP) and a plan to cushion the effect of COVID-19 Pandemic on the Agricultural sectors, is an initiative of the Federal Government to encourage young people especially graduates embrace commercial Agriculture, boost local food production and ensure food sufficiency in Nigeria.
The Vice President, Professor Yemi Osibanjo delivering the National Economic Sustainability Plan in June noted that the Economic Sustainability Plan also proposes to engage more Nigerians through farming, which he said could generate direct and indirect jobs for millions of Nigerians.
“Our Economic Sustainability proposal (in the Agricultural Sector) is that we are trying to bring in 20,000 and 100,000 hectares of land per State for agricultural use, and we are looking at how to work with the states to deliver that, which means we are going to bring in far more farmers into the net and this would mean more jobs for people in the rural areas," Prof Osibanjo emphasized.
The Executive Secretary of NALDA, Prince Paul Ikonne had in a press briefing in June explained that the young farmers would be drawn from the 774 local government areas, with a pilot number of 100 per local government area making 77,400 young farmers across the Federation which would be increased in the subsequent phases.
NALDA in their official website nalda.ng however recently noted that "the Pilot programme will start with empowering 100 young farmers from 3 LGAs in 16 States of the country for a total of 4,800 new young farmers, including the FCT" adding that "the project's final goal would be to encourage, empower and guide 1000 farmers from each of the 774 LGAs in Nigeria each year."
The application for the Young Farmers Network which ended in July has had the applicants anxiously waiting for the shortlisting of the candidates who would participate in the Program.
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