• Federal Capital Territory Photo: Sun News Publishing

More Stories on This Section

In an effort to empower rural population in the Federal Capital Territory, the World Bank is set to give a boost to dry season farming activities in the territory with the release of over N500 million (about $4.2 million) for Fadama 3 project.

Director, FCT Agricultural Development Programme and Project Coordinator for Fadama 2, Mike Uwazie, who disclosed this to Daily Sun said FCT has been selected to participate in Fadama 3 programme due to the level of success it achieved in the second phase of the project.

“FCT is poised for participation in Fadama 3. A month ago, FCT was in the team that negotiated successfully with the World Bank. We have been given $4.2 million for the implementation of Fadama 3”, he stated.

Uwazie also noted that every arrangement is in place to ensure adequate funding of the third phase of the project, which is expected to start in September.
“Provision has already been made for counterpart fund from 2008 budget of the FCT. We have also informed all area councils to make reservation for counterpart funding.”
FCT Administration on its part is giving agricultural activities the boost it requires. The ADP boss further hinted that FCT minister, Dr Modibbo Umar has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with First Bank and Union Bank for an Agricultural Trust Fund scheme. The sum of N25 billion has been made available for farmers to access through the commercial banks.

Agricultural credit guarantee scheme, wharehoused by the CBN, has been in existence since 1978 but commercial banks were not lending funds to the agricultural sector because of the obvious problems, which include poor recovery record, cost of administration was also very high. CBN has now modified that by urging states and NGOs to create trust fund to enable the risks being faced by these commercial banks to be reduced.

He added that the recent swoop on farmers in the FCT by commercial banks is part of the success story of the phase two of the Fadama project. “In addition, other commercial banks like Zenith Bank, UBA, Bank PHB and First Inland Bank are waiting for customers to take credit.”
He continued, “Well over 10 commercial banks are ready to partner with us because of the successes we have recorded. They said before, there were no bankable projects by the farmers and they were not easily identifiable, but with the Fadama 2 we have been able to organize them, form them into groups and we have built their capacity in terms of record keeping so the banks will now check their records in a view to identifying how to assist them with credits.”

The World Bank had earlier invested over N70 million into Fadama 2 which was implemented without full support from the area council’s chairmen who were reluctant to pay the counterpart funding.
Uwazie also identified bad maintenance culture as a key problem hindering the full realization of the vision of the project as some beneficiaries are planning to sell of their assets when they about the winding up of the project.

“Immediately they heard that Fadama 2 was winding up they removed their sign posts because some of them are thinking of selling off those assets. I am aware of this problem but it bothers on our attitude. You give people something that will enable them earn a living they leave it and are still waiting for government intervention. We have to advocate for attitudinal change.”