FCTA: Over 12k farmers will benefit from World Bank’s $4.5m Fadama grant

The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) says about 12,283 farmers will benefit from the World Bank’s $4.5 million grant for its Fadama programme.

Mariya Mahmoud, FCT minister of state, spoke on Thursday during the allocation of the grant to the third batch of 3,707 farmers in Gwagwalada area of the federal capital.

Mahmoud said the grant is part of the $15 million allotted to the FCTA under the World Bank-supported Covid-19 Action Recovery and Economic Stimulus (FCT CARES) programme.

She said a total of 7,940 farmers have benefitted from the programme so far, adding that the first and second batches had about 4,233 beneficiaries.

She said the grant would be used to generate income and for the 2023/2024 dry season farming.

Items distributed at the event included fertilisers, improved seeds and agro-chemicals, personal protective equipment and a sprayer for crop farmers.

Other farming items were day-old chicks and feeds for poultry farmers, juvenile and feeds for fish farmers, goats for livestock farmers and grinding machines for women processors.

The minister said the grant is a “significant milestone” to achieving the renewed hope agenda of President Bola Tinubu.

“The agricultural sector has been chosen as one of the critical intervention areas under the renewed hope agenda, to facilitate the attainment of food and nutritional security,” NAN quoted Mahmoud as saying.

“It will also facilitate the provision of raw materials to our local industries, generation of gainful employment for our teeming unemployed youths, as well as contributing significantly towards increasing the inflow of foreign exchange through export.

“The Fadama programme was deliberately designed to support the recovery of livelihood activities of poor and vulnerable households engaged in agricultural value chains in the FCT, with special consideration to women and unemployed youths.

“Its implementation is being anchored on the World Bank community driven development approach for deployment of programme investments at the community level.”