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Showing posts with label Kaduna. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kaduna. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

FG commissions 12.5m capacity Sugarcane bio-factory





The Federal Government has commissioned her first Sugarcane Bio-factory in Zaria, Kaduna, estimated at 12.5 million cane seedlings per annum,n line with the implementation of her Nigeria Sugar Master Plan (NSMP), reports NaijaAgroNet.

Declaring the Sugarcane Bio-factory open for operations, Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Mr Olusegun Aganga, NaijaAgroNet gathered, said the factory is one-million seedlings per annum capacity.

“The provision of high grade and quality seedlings of sugarcane is essential for the attainment of the set goals of the National Sugar Master Plan.This facility is designed to address a critical constraint facing Nigeria’s sugar industry – timely provision of high quality and clean seeds to sugar estates and farmers across Nigeria.” He said.

Aganga also stressed that the expectation in four years, is that five of this kind of facility would have been established across Nigeria with capacities of between 2million and 2.5million seedlings per annum each.

The NSMP whichis one of the major sectorial policies under the Nigeria Industrial Revolution Plan, enunciated by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment was launched by the President Goodluck Jonathan in February 2014, with an ultimate goal to make Nigeria’s manufacturing sector highly competitive and dynamic.

It is believed that the efficiency in the cultivation and supply of sugarcane will enhance the efficient milling and production of sugar and associated by-products like ethanol and electricity.

The bio-factory would serve as a facility where disease-free crop seedlings would be rapidly micro-propagated under controlled laboratory environment for planting in the fields, as NaijaAgroNet learnt, and the NSMP projects that at least 250,000 hectares of sugarcane fields would be required for processing in about 28 mills of varying capacities to produce 1.79 metric tonnes of sugar in the first phase of the master plan.

Daniel Nsolibe/GEE
 

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Thursday, September 26, 2013

Kaduna women, youths train on bull husbandry

Anthony Nwakaegho/NaijaAgroNet
A two-week training has been mapped out for the training of women and youths by Kaduna State in bull husbandry by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) in collaboration with office of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and College of Agriculture and Animal Science in Kaduna
Funding for the training was from the MDGs office to provide skills in fattening of cattle for the women and youths in the state, as gathered by NaijaAgroNet.
Opening the training, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina represented by the Director of Planning, Research and Statistic in the Ministry, Umar Farouk Hussaini decried Nigerian's reliance on imported food, stressing that the training was part of Federal Government's desire to build the capacity of 8,000 youths and women in various agricultural fields including fishery, cassava production, animal husbandry and poultry.
"Whatever we are providing here is a starter pack to the participants as something they should use to get a take-off in their lives. At the end of the training, bulls and feeds among others will be distributed to the participants to start with and sell later on when they are fattened," he said,
Provost of College of Agriculture and Animal Science, Dr Balarabe Jahun informed NaijaAgroNet that Nigeria spends over $5.2 billion annually on food importation, which is equivalent to 48 per cent of the country's total gross income.
He lamented that if the citizens of any nation no matter how rich they may depends on food importation the country  will still remain in a poor state and that is the situation in Nigeria.
   NaijaAgroNet             

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