The President of the African
Development Bank (AfDB) Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, has urged African leaders to
make agriculture attractive for the younger generation, reports NaijaAgroNet.
He was speaking on the occasion of the 2017 World Food Day, AfDB
president highlighted how Africa’s food security depends on attracting young
people to agriculture and agribusiness. The sector can potentially create
wealth and employment for African youth, thereby stemming migration.
World Food Day, celebrated yearly on October 16, promotes
worldwide awareness and action for those who suffer from hunger and the need to
ensure food security and nutritious diets for all, which this year’s theme
focused on the need to ‘Change the future of migration; Invest in food security
and rural development’.
The AfDB’s ENABLE Youth programme, which grooming a crop of
young agriculturists, is on course to make this happen.
Mahmud Johnson, 26, is the Founder of J-Palm Liberia which
works to improve income for Liberia’s smallholder oil palm farmers by 50-80 per
cent. He is also creating additional jobs for over 1,000 young people to work
as sales representatives for his products.
“Despite the tremendous odds, we (African youth) are
determined to maximize our abundant agricultural resources to create wealth,
jobs, and socioeconomic opportunities in our countries and across the
continent. We need our stakeholders to view us as serious partners in Africa’s
transformation, and to work with us to expand our enterprises,” Mahmud said.
Mahmud and some of his employees have benefited from
capacity building programs under the AfDB’s Empowering Novel Agri-Business-Led
Employment for Youth initiative.
Like Mahmud, many African youth are passionate about staying
back on the continent to create wealth and employment, if given the tools and
opportunities to put their skills to use. Under the ENABLE Youth program, the
Bank is working with the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture
(IITA) to develop a new generation of young commercial farmers and agribusiness
entrepreneurs.
“Our goal is to develop 10,000 such young agricultural
entrepreneurs per country in the next 10 years. In 2016, the Bank provided US
$700 million to support this program in eight countries and we've got requests
now from 33 countries,” said Adesina.
The Bank considers investment in agriculture as key to
making Africa youths prosperous, thereby stemming the tide of migration.
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