She said that she believes there is reason to be optimistic that Africa’s agriculture sector is moving toward a brighter future, particularly in the rising use of information technology to improve agriculture production and access to financing, something she said, will play an important role in attracting more young Africans to farm-related ventures,
“We have seen this work in Nigeria with the ‘e-wallet’ and in Kenya with M-Pesa,” she said.
Peace also singled out AGRA for its ongoing effort to increase access to seed, fertilizers and other inputs and promote market and policy improvements that will allow the economic benefits of agriculture to be shared more broadly. The AU Commissioner also called on the continent leaders to banish the hand hoe into a museum, reports NaijaAgroNet.
She said that for the 2015 African
Green Revolution Forum (AGRF) to stay true to its theme of “Walking the Talk on
Youth and Women,” delegates must firmly embrace pledge from the 2014 AGRF to banish
the hand hoe.
“We need to banish the hand-hoe to
liberate our hardworking mothers and sisters from the drudgery associated with
agriculture and increase their productivity and return from their labour. And I
don’t believe our young people will be attracted to agriculture if we are still
using the hand hoe,” Peace said.
Peace, NaijaAgroNet
gathered, was the keynote speaker as the AGRF moved into the heart of its
deliberations over how to increase production and incomes in Africa’s farm
sector - while also generating better opportunities for the 10 million young
Africans entering the job market every year and for women across Africa, most
of whom are already farmers.
Cyriacus Nnaji/ED,OPs
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