Group trains 48 youths on sustainable oil palm farming

AGROUP, Solidaridad West Africa in Nigeria, has trained 48 youths from four states on climate- smart and sustainable oil palm farming.

The programme, under the National Initiatives for Sustainable and ClimateSmart Agriculture, selected young farmers from Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Kogi and Enugu states, who are smallscale oil palm producers to boost yield and increase their income.

Speaking during the training in Calabar, Solidaridad Programme Manager, Oil Palm, Nigeria, Kene Onukwube, said the training was aimed at equipping beneficiaries with the required skills to serve as enumerators in their various communities, keep to the principles of sustainable landscapes and to ensure that greenhouse gas emission was reduced to the barest minimum.

He said it would also contribute to Nigeria’s drive towards achieving the SDGS on climate change, zero hunger, poverty alleviation and youth development in the country.

“We are bringing together people we have coached and mentored for the past one and a half years through our agricultural academy. We are training some in producing oil palm seedlings.

“We are bringing in best management practices for farmers to up their yield to at least 7.5 to 10 tonnes per hectare, which used to be 2.0 to 2.5 metric tonnes per hectare,” he said.

He emphasised that the trainees would also be empowered so that during the oil palm off season, they would be generating income.