CBN Africa commissioned a Food Processing Facility in Ibadan, Oyo State on the 14th of February, 2018. The project was executed through the scheme of ‘Grant Assistance for Grassroots Human Security Project’ (GGP) of the Japanese Embassy in Abuja. CBN Africa constructed and equipped a palm fruit and cassava/garri processing facility through this scheme. The aim of the project was enhance the quality of the production process with the use of mechanized machinery.
Under the scheme, the Embassy of Japan has so far implemented a total of 158 projects in various regions. Some of these projects are in the area of primary health, vocational training and agriculture. The total amount spent so far is over 11 million US dollars in the course of 2 decades. This food processing project is one of them.
We worked with the Ife-Oluwa Farmers Cooperative in the rural community of Adetoyebi-Ajibode village in Akinyele LGA of Oyo State. Our partners for the project, The Ruth Adeosun Care Foundation, ensured that this project benefits about 120 local farmers. They will be the immediate beneficiaries, with surrounding communities also expected to be secondary beneficiaries.
The facility and its modern machinery are a marked improvement on the traditional methods previously used by the farmers. The methods previously employed were laborious and time-consuming with very low output and productivity. However, with the new machines, output and productivity of the farmers cooperative are expected to increase by over 50%.
The commissioning ceremony had in attendance the Regional Director of CBN Africa, Dr Felix Oisamoje. He formally handed over the facility to Honourable Adewale, a community leader and representative of the farmers’ cooperative. Also in attendance was the Special Adviser to the Japanese Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr Tetsuya Imamura as well as the Chairman of Akinyele LGA, Mr Olumide Alli and traditional leaders from the community.
In his speech, Mr Tetsuya noted that “‘Social Stability for Shared Prosperity’ is one of the priority areas in the 2016 Nairobi Declaration of Tokyo International Conference on African Development(TICAD VI). For this realization, Japan strongly commits towards comprehensive measures to establish the social stability foundation, and agriculture is one of the important measures. We wish this project will also contribute to such stabilization of this society.”
We hope that, through this intervention, many farmers will be able to efficiently make use of this facility and ultimately contribute to creating a better future for Nigeria at large.
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