THE GUARDIAN, "'1J~August 2J,2012
BUSINESS
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Fanners flay implementation of gdvt's agric scheme D\AA1 ERS ;in Della have C dttried the p<.o(lr implem~ntation of the Fed~ra l Govern m~nt's Jogliculture Tr.msformalion SCbeJ1~ In th~
sta t~
access the
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promised by the g~rnmenL He told tIle News Agencyof Nigem (NAN) In Asaba, that ~mmem mlght ha~ good Intemlons with the agricul, cure transformation programme, Its ImplelMmation was poor and lII.fimed Ejezle said that h~ had made frantic efforts for fal'TTltrs In the SGlte, especially mem bers of his association to get the
imp~
rice seedlings ilnd rertliiserbut to noaval!: According to Ejuie, there are no f~r than 39 redemption centres for ml:' scheme across the 2S IOGI.I government al1'as In the state but no ne has rttelved any of the farming Inputs. . - In fact. many members have not recl:'lvl:'d alen to show that they have been
given some of the items and those who have ll!'Ceived the alert. have not accessed the
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'-lhe sad a..spea. Is that we are already In August and knowing tha t fa nning Is timeframed, none of us will ~ the in puts In this fuming season.~
He, however; disclosed that he had ~ n Informed that
few bags of rice and mai Ze Were available for plan ting but would not be distributed until there \vaS fenlllser to complement It. •• As things stand now, no rice f<lrmer, and Ind«d, no fanner an go to me fit ld now to plant because It Is a/ready late to do so In this part of the counlTY,~ he said. Ejezle u~ the government to work directly with farmers' assodatiollS.Silying that II was obvious that some agro-deaJ. erscharged widl the responsibility ofalsbibuting the Items \W're Insincere. A maize fanner In the state, Mr. Samuel Agblgbl said the problem with the <lgriallture lransfonnation agenda was with the conditions £lw:n to agrodealers to dq:JOSTt 25 ~r cenl of me tota.! cOS( Input supplial. --Slncel1'ly. many maize
farmers are complaining about the Growth En hancemeOl Scheme beGiuse of the problems that are beginning to be noticed In its imr,lementarion. -, n me state, mosl agrodeal~rs appointed to distribute me farming Inputs haW' nOI been able to meet up with the ch=lienes because they areex topaY 25 rcent of w ,uever suppt: they
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- 'So me inputsare locked up somewhere that we do not know, a nd farmers cannot haV\! ~ccess to them in spiteo! a1e.ns already sent to them to go and pick up the fanning rlems,~ Agbigbi said. He appealed to lhe goW'm me.n[ to quickly intervt:rle in the system o r review the process so as to keep the confi· dence of the ptOple In the scheme.
...As Edo farmers lament
paucity of fertiliser
chose Delta for telecom innovation, by Srivastava Hotel, Effurun. Accordi ng to Srivastava, beside the huge contribution to the nation'seconomy; Delta had shown passion abOut takIng a leaders hip position In lenn5 oftelttommunications network coverage. quality of Rrvlce a nd excqmonal customer t:ll~rience ~t is why \W' ha~ come out here. .Jlot lust to pl1'St:nt our brand to you but also to hig hlig ht how ~ Intend to transfOrm th~ telecommunlcalion landscape in Delta SUte; Srivastava said
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He added that ..-Jnel had a big agenda for th~ state and thatlh~ rum \vaS keen on pannenng with the people of the
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Accordingto the Alnel chief, th t [elecom company has taken significant Stride In designing specific telecommu nic.alion solu tio ns that wi ll mftt the IIfestyl ~ of Oeltans. adding mat Ui~ fi rm YIOuJd empower me people of the stilte to succeed through their innovative ilnd affordable telecoms offerings. SrivaruVil listed Airtel's
major achl~ments indudIng doubling the number of sites In t he counuy, 3000 J.75G sites launched, IaIgest 3.75G In Afric.a, connea2" rural communities, deplo CM!r SlS kilometre fibl1' ye.u a nd 2,070 kl10merre ongOing and that DOiLffic had inci'eased by l24 percmt since acquisition I n 2010_ He said Ainel was th~ best liked by customers as Indiated bymeovtrall customer satIsfactJo n Index, as well as, the CST be:s;t In the Industry to mention a few;
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D\RMERS in Etto have: -when formu lating a polky, C decrled the unavailability government should alwil)'S of feniliser for thei r use. In ~ ke into account the people Splttof theoperatJon ofe-wal- whom such policy is meant let system of distri bution of for by planning wi th them the commodity as recently and not planning for mem,M Introduced by Federal he stated <iovtmmenL He admitted that som!" They I<lmented that they fa rmers in the ilrl".1 got phon~ had bein wlmou t the crop- alerts, which d iJ"t(ttil mem to enhancement fanni ng input placr::'i whel1' they could lind since the commencement of fertil~ bUI that the addressth~ current fanning season, es given In the alert rnes.sages noting that they tlad gone wel1'"fake: through 95 percent of the seaAccording to him, the place son's activities without the we were asked to go for our ftttlilser. fertilisers was a I1'side.ntial Alhajl Mohammed Abdulahl, building In Auchl and not a co-oi-dlnator of All Fanners wareho use as o ne expected As:socLation of Nigeria (MAN) and of course, the product in Edo North se:natol1al dis- was not in the pl1'mlses. mct told News Agency of -y.{f:' \W'~ happy when \W' NlcerliJ ( NAN~ In Auchi, that got me alen and \W' immedlthe situation was dlscourag- at~ly rushed to the address, Ing 10 the fanne~ but to our surprise thl:' "We <111' in August and I un <lddress \vaS no( only resldentell you that no Tarmtr In this tiaI, mere was nobOdy In the statehasm:t:l donegtdlnof bUilding, who knew about fe:nl iiser and we are at a loss any plan to distribute fe:nilizon what to do, - he lamented er there. He said tha t the e-wallet sys, hav!- personally visittd and tern, which the gOVUTlment re-visited the place to be: sure said wouJd be e.Hective: and we were not wrong. Th~ timely In the distribution of painful aspect is that !bere Is the product. had failed [0 nobody to reach or discuss meet th~ expectations of with o n this iSSue In case farmers In the state. of this type of problem, as the Mohammed. who. however. alert d id ·not conGlin any telelauded the e-wallet system, phone number. remarked that many tattors -I eo.'t:I1 went to the state minwere not ronsideredln 113 (or- Istry of agriculture where I mul<ltio n.Hesaidthatpeople, met the commissioner and who the e-wallet system was his response\vaS tha t the stilte me<l nt for were not carried was not iovol\'td in the new along whll~ the policy was fertiliser d iStribution system," h~ said. bt:lng fonnulated --,.,~
canvasses partnership with states [file Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRCI official said that Aregbeso a began the rift train ride to Osunbound comm·uters during the lO ll Eld -el-K.abir festfval. '· nle free ride In the train has availed many people t he up portunlty to travel to tneir villages with thelrfamllies, ana ca r ry as much propeny as they wanted. • ' You can see {,arenu travelling with their chil(lren, <lnd arryi ng bags of
rice, big maUresses, drums, gas cookers a nd cyli nders, as well as, other household utensils that may be dam· aged. when squeezed In public bus6, even a t eJtorbiGl nt fares." NAN reports thill the tr.Iln Idt the Iddo terminus .1.1 9:45 a.m half Oil ed o n Friday, to acco mmod<lte other passengers at Agege and Ijoko, wnile anot her trai n Idt for Osu n o n Saturday. Of the U cO<lches on the
Osun trip, only one was used for loading t he goods [0 avoid overcrowdin g. Some o( the travellers comme nded Gov. Ar~gbe.sola's gesture, which availed them the opporrunlty to rravel with me mbers of their familles. A housewife, Mrs Abe:nl Adln said th~ fre:e tram ride had enabled her to travtl with her child ren. '" have be~n thinking of whe.re to get the money to convey my fo ur grown up
childre n to oshogbo to spend Pol rt of their vaca tion with my mother. Thank God {or this opportun ity." A relired civi l servant, Mr. Olajlde Sanyaolu said the free ride. had availed him the opponunl ty to mOVe some of his prop~rty to Ede, his home town. '- This free. ride has savtd me the pains of moving my va luables [0 my village, where I will be spending ml retirement with my fam ily. "tWo school children,
Ishaq and Abolort Junaid, app r~cl ate d the free ride, saying it had given them tht opportun ity to travel to lh~ ir villages with lhelr parents and two other slblrngs at every festive. period. -'We pray that Osun goYe mm~ nt should be ab le 10 sustain this gestul1', to give other child ren the opportunity and pleasure of travelling by train, a nd also spend ing festive period in th l:'lr ho metowns.