Food Security: NGO Partner States Trains Farmers To Fight Malnutrition

By Abdullahi Alhassan Kaduna.

A Non governmental organization, called Global Alliance for improved Nutrition,(GAIN).has organize a one day stakeholders forum with the aim of finding ways of providing farmers necessary knowledge of producing Nutrients food crops,and connect the farmers with food chain distributors.

Speaking during the Lunching of the project in Kaduna the Senior Project Manager, Supply Chain for Commercialisation, Mr, Godwin Ehiabhi, said” the Global Alliance for lmproved (GAIN) is implementing the Strengthenin Nutrition in Priority Staples project,(SNIPS) in Nigeria in partnership with Green innovation Centre for the Agricultural and Food sector in Nigeria,(GIZ) with support from the German Government through the Federal Ministry for Economic cooperation and Development (BMZ).

“we want ensure food and Nutrition security is one of the most pressing challenges for sustainable social and Economic development in Nigeria, meeting this need presents an important opportunity for tackling malnutrition,Diets of rural Nigerians are particularly poor,and many Nigerians currently experience vitamin and mineral deficiencies leading to severe health outcomes including premature and preventable death especially in under 5 – year old.

He said ” according to NDHS in 2018 approximately 66% of Nigerian children are at risk of vitamin A deficiency due to a lack of deversity in their diets as a consequence of poverty. “This hidden hunger ” is particularly prevalent among farming families who are overly reliant on Staple food.

The number of people at the risk from unsafe food is also alarming an estimated 173 million cases of diarrhea due to foodborne illness and about 33,000 deaths are reported in Nigeria,So we want to Increased consumption of safe, nutritious foods by smallholder farmers, their families, and the wider population.

we also Strengthened production of cassava, maize, sweet potato, and Rice value chains in Nigeria which provide more, safe nutritious foods to consumers, Increased use of nutritious varieties of the target staples in processed foods Improved productivity & efficiency of farmers and other businesses to improve the production of safe, nutritious foods in the cassava, maize, sweet potato, and rice value chains,

He further said” the this project will last for 5 years, which will cover some Selected States ,Kaduna , Nassarawa, Benue, and Oyo, States, and in each select State we select some local government areas to execute this project,he added.

In an interview with the Project Manager Business Support, Mrs, Mercy Olorufemi, said” the workforce Nutrition workstream of the Strengthenin Nutrition project will be a comprehensive set of food and non-food based activities targeting farmers and other workers processors along the Rice maize value chains.

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“The business support work stream of the intervention will increase women and Youth involvement in value added agriculture and entreprenurship, improve Nutrition quality of Staple food produced by SMEs and farmers, improve capacity of value chain actors to adhere to food safety standard regulations on best practice, as well as support and catalyse technical innovations for supply chains through innovation challenges and innovation clinics.

We will also Provide entreprenurship support and appropriately scaled training to farming households, women led cooperatives and other small scale entreprenuers, targeting women and youth led businesses, on small sale processing of nutritious foods and food products using biofortified staples, including raw material handling, quality control, packaging and finishing.

We want to reach out to Year 2=810 Year 3=1620 Year, 4=2430Year, 5=540 and a total of =5400. this Selected farming households and conduct cluster trainings through ToT on community seed multiplication, and support with Biofortified planting materials
reach Numbers=160Year, 2=24Year 3=48Year, 4=72 Year, 5=16

Organize GAP trainings for farmers in 12 LGAs of implementation, set up demo plots, produce GAP training manual Total reach =3000, VAM=2000, VAC=750, OFSP=250. she concluded.

In his Goodwill message, the Hounarable Commissioner Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources Kaduna state, Mallam Jafaru Sani Ibrahim, Represented by Mr,Bege Dutse Bengon Director in the Ministry ,said” we welcome any activities that add value to what we are doing, they have come and said they want to work on Nutrition, which is commendable, no state cannot survive without agriculture activities,and farming is not something that you can neglect as a state or individual,the kaduna state government is very committed in agricultural activities.

“we have both Human and Natural Resources in the state, North Western States are affected by high rate of mulnutrion deficiency children in the zone ,and will partner and work with them, we have similar agency in Kaduna that works on malnutrition called KADA, we refer them to the agency for colabarative, to work in certain areas that was not covered which l believe this address the problem,in the state and the zone and the entire country as a whole.

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