News
Oyo governor–elect, Makinde unveils plan on agric
Oyo state governor-elect, Engr. Oluseyi Makinde on Monday pledged to give agricultural development priority attention when he is sworn-in on the 29th May, 2019.
The governor-elect gave this assurance at the opening of a two-day workshop on Human Resource Development of Rural Farmers through Innovative Information Technology held at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Ibadan.
The two-day workshop organized by Dr. Lilian Otaye-Ebede and Dr. Olatunde Durowoju on behalf of Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) forms part of the remit of the Global Challenge Research Fund (GCRF) to tackle the challenges faced by developing countries. It was attended by various stakeholders including farmers, farm owners, extension agents, academics, members of research institutions, advocacy groups and other relevant stakeholders who converged at IITA, Ibadan to discuss the challenges affecting the effective and efficient dissemination of information on innovative technologies to farmers, especially rural farmers.
One of the key themes that emerged from deliberations in the workshop was a need to urgently assess extension services through public and/or private partnerships in order to ameliorate the lack of funds and capacity that have plagued that sector of the value chain.
Another important theme that emerged was the need to have pressure groups/lobbyists from different stakeholder committees that will advocate for investment in agricultural support services both from public and private establishments. More importantly, the stakeholders felt the context of the farmers should be considered when designing and disseminating new technologies. Therefore, farmers should be engaged from the idea generation phase all through to the prototype testing phase.
Engr Makinde, who declared the workshop open, said he was surprised at the level of poverty of people in the rural areas of Oyo State during his campaign before his election. He wondered what had happened to the extension systems of transferring improved technologies to farmers in rural areas of the State. He promised to pay serious attention to the plight of rural farmers “because without food security no country can claim to be totally independent,” he said.
Presenting a paper on the occasion, the governor-elect noted that agricultural information generation and dissemination were necessary for the development of agriculture.
He lauded the sponsors – Liverpool John Moores University for developing such an initiative and for working in collaboration with IITA and Practical Action Consulting in delivering this important project.
The PDP chieftain added that it would be the priority of the next administration under his leadership in the state to proffer solutions to the challenges of poor farmers in the rural areas.
“The obvious manpower and infrastructural needs of the Extension Services Department of our Ministry of Agriculture shall be addressed with utmost urgency, poor rural roads, power and water supply are issues that shall be addressed equally and simultaneously if we want free flow of information dissemination in rural agriculture,” he emphasized.
Makinde concluded that there must be a regular forum for the town and the gown to meet under his administration to bring the benefits of agricultural research institutes, universities and all other agro-allied institutions in Oyo State to bear on the farmers to help solve the problems of food insecurity.
In his own address, the Director for West Africa at IITA, Dr Robert Asiedu pledged the commitment of IITA to work with the state and Liverpool John Moores University to help improve agriculture and the livelihoods of farmers in the state in particular, and Nigeria in general.
He explained that as an institution, IITA had set for itself the goal of taking “11 million people out of poverty and reclaiming 7.5 million hectares of degraded land,” and that to achieve that goal required partnership with state and non-state actors.
By Idowu Ayodele
Dangote Petroleum Refinery has made headlines by announcing a further reduction in the price of diesel, dropping it from ₦1200 to ₦1000 naira per litre.
The refinery’s decision comes on the heels of its recent supply at a significantly reduced price of ₦1200 per litre, which was introduced three weeks ago, signifying a remarkable 30 per cent decrease from the previous market price of approximately ₦1600 per litre.
This substantial reduction in diesel prices at Dangote Petroleum Refinery is expected to reiterate positively throughout various sectors of the economy, potentially serving as a catalyst in alleviating the persistently high inflation rate in the country.
In a statement last week, Aliko Dangote, Africa’s wealthiest individual and the owner of the refinery, expressed his optimism regarding the potential impact of the price reduction on inflation in Nigeria.
“I believe that we are on the right track. I believe Nigerians have been patient, and I also believe that a lot of goodies will now come through. There’s quite a lot of improvement because if you look at it, one of the major issues that we’ve had was the naira devaluation that has gone very aggressively up to about ₦1900,” he remarked.
As anticipation builds around the implications of this move by Dangote Petroleum Refinery, stakeholders and consumers alike remain hopeful for the positive effects it could bring to the Nigerian economy in the coming months.
More than 50,000 Russian military personnel have died during the Ukraine conflict, the BBC reported Wednesday, citing its own reporters, independent media group Mediazona and volunteers.
They found that more than 27,300 Russian soldiers died during the second year of the war, a 25-percent increase on the first year.
BBC Russian, Mediazona and volunteers have been counting deaths since February 2022, using open-source information from official reports and the media, as well as using satellite images of Russian cemeteries to estimate the number of new graves.
The figure of more than 50,000 is eight times higher than the official toll acknowledged by Moscow in September 2022. It does not include deaths of militia in Donetsk and Lugansk in eastern Ukraine.
Ukraine said in February that it had lost 31,000 soldiers, but that figure is also likely to be significantly lower than the true toll.
Russian losses spiked in January 2023 as it launched a large-scale offensive in Donetsk and again months later last year during the battle for the city of Bakhmut.
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a “special military operation” at dawn on February 24, 2022, which has since turned into a bloody and attritional war, isolating Russia from the Western world.
Responding to the report, the Kremlin said it did not disclose any information on military deaths and casualties, which falls under the remit of the defence ministry.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov added official secrets laws and those covering what Russia calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine meant it was “absolutely understandable” that the ministry did not release the figures.
The National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) has disclosed that 95 million Nigerians need to enroll for the National Identification Number (NIN) to meet its target of 200 million enrollments by 2025.
Kayode Adegoke, Head of Corporate Communications at NIMC, emphasised the importance of this enrollment during an interview on X over the weekend.
He stated, “For NIMC to meet the 200 million target by 2025, 95 million Nigerians need to register for the NIN.”
Adegoke revealed that over 105 million NINs have been issued to Nigerians and legal residents so far.
He assured Nigerians of the commission’s commitment, saying, “We want to assure Nigerians that within the next one or two years, we will reach our target of enrolling all Nigerians.”
“The NIN serves as a unique identifier for each citizen and has become increasingly important for various government initiatives aimed at improving security, governance, and service delivery.”
Adegoke highlighted the efforts to streamline the modification and enrollment processes under the leadership of Abisoye Coker, the director-general of NIMC. He announced the development of a self-service platform, allowing Nigerians to make necessary modifications such as changing names, dates of birth, email addresses, and phone numbers from anywhere, using different devices.
Emphasising the convenience of the self-service modification portal, Adegoke encouraged Nigerians to utilize this innovative solution.
He noted the evolution of the process, citing the past requirement for applicants to visit NIMC offices for data corrections.
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