Lagos to Empower 400 Pig Farmers

Lagos to Empower 400 Pig Farmers

Lagos State Government has said 300 Youth Agripreneurs from participants of the Agripreneurship Programme (LAP) and Agricultural Youth Empowerment Scheme (Agric-YES) will be empowered at its Y2021 Agricultural Value Chains Empowerment Programme holding on July 29.

Agriculture Commissioner Ms. Abisola Olusanya, who made this known at the weekend at the sensitisation programme of beneficiaries of this year’s empowerment programme, said this was imperative following the government’s resolve to create an enabling environment for youths in the agriculture land space to thrive.

According to Olusanya, the youths are the future of agriculture, as they will be the ones to replace the aged and aging farmers and agripreneurs, hence the need to prioritise them in this year’s empowerment programme.

She said the 300 beneficiaries include outstanding participants from the two programmes, adding that they would be put in incubation centres, support them with extension services as well as bring donor agencies to them with a view to seeing how they could be supported.

The State Government has said the formulation of a data system for the labour market is critical to reducing unemployment.

Economic Planning and Budget Commissioner Mr. Sam Egube said at the weekend that scaling up skill development capacity with technical, vocational education and training would also reduce joblessness.

He said the design and creation of the information system was to provide accurate and reliable data on current job status of residents for job creators, employers, seekers and other stakeholders.

The Commissioner, speaking at an event on Victoria Island, Lagos, organised by the Ministry of Economic Planning and Budget, in collaboration with the State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF) and German Cooperation GIZ tagged: “Lagos4Jobs: Public-Private Dialogue on Labour Market in Lagos State”, said the move by the government was targeted at youths to address unemployment, bridge the gap between job availability and employability in the labour market and increase youths’ participation in technical and vocational education.

He said: “To drive initiatives around job creation, it is critical to develop a system that provides accurate and reliable data on current job status of residents. A platform where multiple stakeholders can collaboratively synergise their information, expertise and activities towards achieving the common goal-job creation and employment.

“A Labour Market Information System (LMIS) will aggregate the data of residents by utilising unique identification numbers such as the Lagos State Residents Registration Agency (LASRRA) number and Tax ID to track the job status of residents, to develop initiatives that will drive and sustain employment and job creation.”

Tobias Wolfgarten, the team leader, GIZ Skill Development for Youth Employment (SYKE) Project in Lagos, said the dialogue would provide avenues for stakeholders to deliberate on areas in job creation, aspects of skill development and sustainable growth for decent employment.

He said subsequent meetings of stakeholders of private and public sectors in the state, as well as some of the Federal Government agencies based in the state would chart the way forward for technical working groups.

“In a society like ours where there is so much demoralisation, the people who are most impacted are the youth. The book, ‘My Vision’, by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the leader of Dubai, said: ‘When a government does not act in the right manner, demoralisation sets in, especially for the youth. When youths are frustrated, chaos will definitely set in.

 

“Under the mandate of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, after exclusive deliberations around, what we need to do to make this year’s empowerment different, we felt it imperative that we could not keep training people and pushing them out into the market to fend for themselves. We need to give them the mentorship and resources to help them stand on their own.

“Essentially, this is like a pilot empowerment programme for the youth in a way and manner we haven’t done before. The idea is, we will empower you, but we want you to be within a location where our people can provide you with the support services, professional advice, where we can bring people with technology to help you improve, make better money and increase your yield.

“We have 300 participants out of which 240 are for aquaculture and 60 for poultry. Out of the 240 going for Aquaculture, we will have about 80 in the facility in Araga, Epe while the remaining 160 will be at the Lagos Food Production Centre, Avia, Badagry,” the Commissioner said.

She noted that each of the 240 aquaculture students would be empowered with 700 juveniles, 25 bags of feed as well as medication, while the 60 poultry students would be given 480 point of lay, 100 bags of feed and medication valued at N380,000.00 and N1.8million per participants.

Olusanya said this year’s empowerment programme is different, as it essentially focuses on three specific value chains of Poultry, Piggery and Aquaculture (Artisanal Fisheries) that were most affected by the Coronavirus pandemic and the outbreak of zoonotic diseases.