Oyo State has the potential to generate commercial quantities of tomatoes, pepper, chilli and ginger, the Director General of the Oyo State Agribusiness Development Agency Dr. Debo Akande has said.
Dr. Akande was addressing about 100 Oyo State farmers at an event in Ibadan organised to avail farmers with best practices to overcome challenges associated with several agricultural value chains and make Nigeria’s agro products more competitive in international markets.
The event which focused on value chains in tomato, chilli, pepper, ginger, leather and garment was organized by the Nigeria Competitiveness Project (NICOP) and the Federal Ministry of Trade and Investment in collaboration with the Oyo State Government.
Dr. Akande revealed that over 9,000 farmers in Oyo State including tomato farmers have been empowered with improved inputs, fertilizers and pesticides by the government of his Excellency Engr Seyi Makinde.
In addition, OYSADA also has several projects targeted at boosting the tomatoes value chain and increasing domestic production including the Oyo State Youth Entrepreneurship Tomato Value Chain project under the agency’s Youth in Agribusiness Programme.
The project is aimed at providing technical, entrepreneurship and management skills for young adults in Oyo state between the ages of 25-35 to establish profitable agribusinesses in the tomato value chain.
100 young farmers are currently being incubated at the Oyo State IITA Agribusiness Incubation Park, Awe where they’ll leverage the Park’s facilities to gain the technical knowledge, entrepreneurial training and business skills required to exploit existing and emerging opportunities along tomato value chains.
The NICOP Project Coordinator, Alhaji Aliyu Abubakar who was represented by a Deputy Director in the Trade and Investment Ministry, DrInyangArit said Oyo State has the potential to be a global tomato export hub and urged farmers in the state to leverage the programme to meet the goals of NICOP.
Nigeria is currently the second-largest producer of fresh tomatoes in Africa, producing 10.8% of fresh tomatoes in the region. Globally, the country is the 14th largest tomato producer with 2.3 million tonnes in 2016.
