From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
The multi-billion naira Bayelsa Cassava Processing Factory Edebebiri, Sagbama Local Government Area of Bayelsa State is set to train and employ delegates of the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP).
The Interim Administrator, PAP, Col. Milland Dixon Dikio (rtd) who disclosed this said the 60-metric ton factory fortified with modern equipment to process starch from cassava would train the PAP delegates on cassava farming and starch processing.
Dikio, who was represented by his Special Assistant on Projects, Godwin Ekpo during an inspection tour explained that about 1000 PAP delegates were expected to be trained in the cassava value chain and employed as outgrowers of cassava stems to feed the factory’s operations.
According to him the arrangement was in line with the PAP’s Train-Employ and Mentor (TEM) empowerment strategy.
He said the decision to send ex-agitators to the facility also aligned with the food security focus of PAP’s programme.
Dikio said delegates would learn cassava cultivation, production, processing, equipment maintenance and other businesses involved in the cassava value chain.
“This is a 60 metric tons of cassava processing plant. It has a huge capacity and it is part of the facility that we will use for our “Train, Employ and Mentor empowerment strategy.
“Even if everybody in this community plants cassava, it has the capacity to absorb all of it. We can see the entire value chain. This is a facility that will help many of our delegates and give them employment. It is an incredible facility located in the region. It will help them and also achieve our vision of turning these ex-agitators into entrepreneurs”
The Project Management Consultant for the facility, Mr. Adebowale Ayoade who described it as the biggest industrial starch plant in Nigeria and the second largest in Sub-Saharan Africa, noted that the delegates will receive theoretical and practical trainings on cassava cultivation and management.
He further explained that the factory will buy all the cassava from the delegates’ farms and they will be certified by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA).
“They will be taught theoretical and practical cassava farming courses from beginning to end, both in the classrooms and farms. The people who are coming to conduct the training are IITA certified trainers.
The factory can do 60,000 metric tons of industrial starch working at a single shift of 250 days in a year and what that translates to is that we need about 200,000 tons of cassava to feed it. We need to farm on 10, 000 hectares of land.”