YAP proposal #108: Producing millet and wheat seed (Ahamed Tijjani Abdullahi, Nigeria)

I am a youth with passion for agriculture who believes that the future of my country and generation depends on agriculture. As an agriculturalist and a research technician with the Lake Chad Research Institute in Maiduguri, my proposed project is on Pearl millet [Pennisetum glaucum(L.) R. Br.] and Wheat (Triticum estivum) seed production.

The most critical challenge of Nigeria today is curtailment of food imports and conservation of foreign exchange. Consequently, transformation of production of some key food crops is a fundamental issue which the Nigerian state has had to address. Wheat is the most classical strategic food crop, on which the country expends over 700 billion Naira of foreign exchange annually on its importation arising from persistent deficit between domestic need and local production. Nigeria is currently only 2.4% self sufficient in wheat production, with the balance of 4.1 million MT met annually through imports mainly from USA. The challenge therefore remains whether Nigeria can produce some of its requirements to reduce dependence on imports, how large is this potential and what are the limiting factors and intervention strategies?

The existence of the cold harmattan season and heat tolerant genotypes has made the production of wheat possible in Nigeria especially Northern Nigeria.

Pearl millet [Pennisetum glaucum(L.) R. Br.], provides diet for over 40 million people who live especially in the arid and semi-arid of Northern Nigeria. Pearl Millet production in Nigeria during the last decade has increased only by 0.7%, the lowest growth rate of any food crop in the region, and far less than the population growth rate of 2.38%, a great gap needed to be filled.

My state Borno in the north-eastern part of Nigeria have been ravaged by insecurity and instability by the activity of the terror group known as Boko Haram. Boko Haram activities have seriously affected agricultural production throughout the sub region as farmers no longer goes to their farms due to fear for their lives. For the past three years agricultural productivity have been down by more than 70%. Hence the need for my project is to provide enough seeds of both Millet and wheat for farmers to produce in the next cropping season flowing recent success recorded in the war against the terror group as farmers have lost most of their seed sources thus the need to find alternative.

The steps involve and budget plan for this project are as follows

• Land acquisition
• Land preparation
• Purchase of foundation seeds
• Planting and Management
• Organising a farmer’s field day
• Selection of Seed by farmers
• Harvesting and distribution of seeds to selected farmers.
• Monitoring and evolution
• Phase II
• Redistribution of seeds cultivated by the selected farmers in PhaseI

So far I have acquired the quantity of seeds for both millet and Wheat for the production activities mention above. The major factor that will be used to assess and evaluate the success and progress of this project is through monitoring and evolution as well the performance of beneficiaries in the phase I circle will determine the size and success of the Phase II project circle as more farmers need to be engage for us to bridge the gap created by the insecurity.

Blogpost and picture submitted by Ahamed Tijjani Abdullahi (Nigeria): Ahamedtijjaniabdullahi[at]gmail.com

The content, structure and grammar are at the discretion of the author only.

This post is published as proposal #108 of “YAP” – our “Youth Agripreneur Project”.

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