Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde has said his administration will give more support to farmers and improve infrastructure and security with a view to attracting large investments in agriculture to the state.
He said the intention was to make the state a modern agribusiness hub in sub-saharan Africa.
Makinde spoke at an event themed, “Agribusiness for Food Security Initiative”, held at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Ibadan.
The governor said his administration remained resolute on bringing prosperity to the state and would continue to support youths.
The governor said in his “Roadmap for Accelerated Development”, he had thought of how to take the people from poverty to prosperity.
He said given the state’s comparative advantage of arable land, it was clear that embracing agriculture was the way to go.
Makinde, however, declared that it was also obvious that using the old method of farming would not produce the desired result.
The governor said, “We are a state that is doing poorly on economic indices.
“The Internally-generated Revenue (IGR) was low for a state that has a rich history of economic development and we are close to the nation’s commercial capital.
“Lagos is not far from here. Every month, they do an IGR of about N65bn and here, when we came in, it was N1.8bn but we have now managed to push it close to N4bn. In terms of where we want to be, we have not scratched the surface yet.
“So, we had to find a way to stimulate the economy quickly. Our comparative advantage is the arable land. If we are to achieve accelerated development, we have to build our economy around this advantage.
“The 11 local government areas in Ibadan are double the size of the whole of Lagos State. So, it was a no-brainer that we have to leverage agriculture and agribusiness.
“But we are not content with practising agriculture like it was done in the past. We need an economic solution driven by data. We need an achievable strategy powered in a new way of thinking about agriculture.’’
In his keynote address, former president of Nigeria, who is also an honorary ambassador of IITA, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, said agribusiness would play a vital role in the future of the country.
He said the federal government should not be directly involved in agribusiness since the states have the landmass, resources, manpower, innovations and the infrastructure to develop holistic strategies for food security.
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