Opinion
Kebbi govt to train 10,000 loan seekers
Atiku Bagudu
The Kebbi State government has retained the services of two additional consultants to speed up the process of training 10,000 AGMIES loan applicants across the state.
Mallam Yahaya Sarki, Governor Atiku Bagudu‘s special media adviser, said this in a statement made available to the Nigeria News Agency (NAN) in Birnin Kebbi on Wednesday.
Sarki said a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU)was signed on Wednesday by Secretary of State Government (SSG) Alhaji Babale Umar-Yauri on behalf of the state government with two consulting firms , the Alkali Hussaini Foundation and the Development Research Center. Economies (RECDE), in Birnin Kebbi.
He said SSG, shortly after signing the MoU, he said the Kebbi State government only hired those Entrepreneurial Development Institutes (EDIs)that had expressed interest in the process for the government-established benchmark for the program.
He added that the government had previously sent out an open invitation for IDEs, ensuring that only those who met what the government had set as a benchmark, as to what the government could afford, were selected.
“Prior to signing the MoU virtually all Kebbi-based IDEs had been contacted, there is a benchmark of what the state government can afford in terms of this program.
“So far, out of all those we have contacted or interacted with, only four of them have expressed interest,” he noted.
Previously, ICT Commissioner Abdullahi Magoro introduced Aliyu Hussaini, Executive Director of Alkali Hussaini Foundation and Dr MY Alkali, Chief Consultant of RECDE.
He said: “These two gentlemen are from the Alkali Hussaini Foundation and the Research Center for Developing Economies.
“We will use up to 10 classrooms and provide facilitators for each of the approximately 50 classrooms that are compliant with COVID-19 protocols.
“They will all be working at Birnin Kebbi to make fasting much faster and more convenient for participants who fast during the month of Ramadan.”
He further revealed that the venue for the training would be Makerar Gandu’s Nagari College in Birnin Kebbi.
The Agribusiness / Small and Medium Enterprise Investment Program (AGMIES) is a federal government initiative to support policy efforts and measures to promote agricultural enterprises and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in as vectors of sustainable economic development and job creation.
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