The management of the Lower Niger River Basin Development Authority (LNRBDA) said revealed its contribution towards solving transportation challenges faced by farmers.
In an interview with journalists in Ilorin, the Managing Director of the authority, Dr. Adeniyi Saheed Aremu, disclosed that transportation of food has been one of the factors responsible for food shortage in the country, hence, the authority constructed a number of access roads in both urban and rural settlements.
He added, “some of those roads in the rural areas link the farm sites to the towns to help farmers convey their produce to the nearest markets to prevent post-harvest losses thereby improving the livelihood of the farmers and ensuring food sufficiency.”
Dr. Aremu also said that the authority had in 2017 also established a greenhouse for production of assorted vegetables under a controlled environment. A herd of cattle is being raised for fattening and dairies.
Meanwhile, in a bid to give farmers good platform for productivity, the agency has also carried out about 60 projects ranging from dams construction, boreholes drilling and Flood and Erosion Control Works in different localities under its coverage.
Speaking on the leadership of the authority, Dr. Aremu said efforts to have evenly distribution of resources to the grassroot, another area office was created in Omu-Aran, Kwara South senatorial district.
“One of the major innovations was to create individual budget heads dedicated to each of these area offices as against a single budget line for all the area offices. We have procured at least 2 new tractors with full implements for each of the Area Offices to boost their internally generated revenue drive of the Federal Government. We have spent over N500m on all the area offices since I took over as Managing Director.
“Construction of rice mill building with installation of milling machine in some area offices, clearing of over 1800Ha of land in all the area offices, rehabilitation of residential building in some area offices were carried out, construction of perimeter fencing in some area offices were done, and development of Aquaculture and maintenance of existing canals to boost irrigation farming in commercial quantities.”
