African media urged to leverage WBG’s 9,000 open data to boost good governance

NaijaAgroNet:

Africa media practitioners have been urged to leverage on the World Bank’s estimated 9,000 open data on agriculture, so as to give drive to good governance, reports NaijaAgroNet.

Making this call recently at a 3-day workshop on reporting agriculture hosted by the Africa Media Initiative (AMI) in conjunction with the World Bank in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, the Lead Operations Officer, World Bank Institute’s Global Media Development programme, Mr. Craig Hammer advised participants to explore the power of open data to improve the state of content on agriculture and other sectors of the economy.

He disclosed that World Bank Group, for instance, has over 9,000 development indicators opened including data on health, nutrition, population, gender, poverty and equity, jobs, climate change to name a few.

“There are microdata on 650,000 variables from 1,200 surveys in addition to over 150,000 analyses, reports,” he said.

According to him by leveraging open data, media practitioners on the continent will spur good governance because open data has evidence to drive its story or information.

Hammer, whose presentation was on ‘Data-Driven Journalism Media,’ defined data as information that has been translated into a form that is more convenient to analyze, pointing out that nowadays, the world thrives on three distinct avenues, more so for media practitioners, comprising having access to information and open data, finding agriculture data with today’s relevance.

Showcasing where media fits in open data usage in what he described as information circle, Hammer described media as a watchdog that discloses to the public in real time relevant infomation; microscope which helps to simplify technical governance information thereby promoting accessibility by the public and facilitate engagement.

He also said that by way of media being a megaphone, it helps with the dissemination of now accessible governance information through various channels available to practitioners.

Equally, Hammer said the aforementioned would assist the citizens to understand, discuss and eventually offer feedback for the government to respond adequately.

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IFC, Diamond Bank increase agric finance by N5tn

NaijaAgroNet:

International Finance Corporation,(IFC) a member of the World Bank Group  has said it will provide advisory services to Diamond Bank Plc to help the lender increase access to finance in Nigeria’s agricultural sector by up to $33million (about N5 trillion )over two years.

This was made known in a statement issued by the corporation, sighted by NaijaAgroNet which explained that the projected lending would be extended to small and medium enterprises across the sector, including livestock farmers, producer groups, distributors, processors, traders and retailers.

 “It will also target almost 2,000 small holder farmers.  IFC will provide Diamond Bank with advisory services on strategy, product development and risk management, and help develop a financing model to viably lend to small and medium agribusinesses,” the statement said.

The Group Managing Director/CEO, Diamond Bank, Mr. Alex Otti said the bank has always demonstrated market leadership in the provision of innovative financial services and solutions to all segments of the society and stressing that  partnership with IFC, the bank will serve the Nigeria’s newly emerging bankable population in the agricultural sector better, and create more growth opportunities for the players as well as the economy.

IFC Financial Markets Manager in Sub-saharan Africa, Mr. Ian Weetman, said increasing growth and employment in the agricultural sector was a critical objective for IFC in Nigeria and sub-Saharan Africa; hence the corporation’s advisory services geared towards increasing access to finance throughout the agricultural and food supply chain.

NaijaAgroNet confirmed that IFC and Diamond Bank have been longstanding partners that have seen agriculture as the main activity of the majority of Nigerians,  accounting for 40 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and 60 per cent of employment, but presently only receives 1.4 per cent of total commercial bank lending in the country. 

AN/EDop

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World Bank, France boost agric sector with 37.4bn in Nigeria

Anthony Nwakaegho/NaijaAgroNet                                                                                                

The World Bank Group and the French Development Agency have thrown their weight in supporting the development of rural communities and modernization of agriculture in Adamawa, Enugu, Osun and Niger states to the tune of US$230 million about N37.4 billion.

An online statement sent by Bamidele Oladokun of the World Bank Group and sighted by NaijaAgroNet said the bank is contributing $170 million while the French Development Agency is contributing $60 million under the Second Rural Access and Mobility Project. 

World Bank Director in Nigeria, Marie Francoise Marie-Nelly was quoted in the statement as saying, “agriculture remains the backbone of Nigeria’s rural economy and growth in the non-oil sector which can be accelerated by improving roads that are vital to increase agriculture productivity, access to health as well as education for rural communities.”

It also quoted Task Team Leader and World Bank Senior Infrastructure Economist, Mohammed Dalil Essakali, as saying that “the sooner these rural communities are provided with transport access under the project, the higher the chances that they will see real improvement in their access to social services and to opportunities to market their agriculture products, and hence increase their income.”

 The release read: “Building on the experience from the First Rural Access and Mobility Project (RAMP-1), that is rehabilitating more than 420 kilometers of rural roads and 130 river crossings in Kaduna State, the Second Rural Access and Mobility Project (RAMP-2) launched in Abuja will support rehabilitation, upgrading and maintenance of about 1,450 kilometers of rural roads and building 65 river crossings. 

The statement added that innovative community-based road maintenance schemes will involve local population in the design and operation of maintenance works, thus creating employment opportunities for men and women living along the roads to be rehabilitated.

*With additional report from BusinessDay

 NaijaAgroNet  

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pix: Minister of Agriculture and Rural Dev Dr. Akinwumi  Adesina