FG Releases 1000 Packs Of Herbicide To Osun Cassava Farmers

Osun chapter of the Nigeria Cassava Growers Association on Wednesday said it had received 1,000 packs of herbicide to boost production of cassava in the state.
The Chairman of the Association, Mr David Ogunsade, said on Wednesday in Osogbo that the release of the herbicide by the government was to facilitate cassava revolution in the country.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that each herbicide pack contains 12 bottles of 4 litres of the chemical.
According to Ogunsade, cassava farmers in Osun are already cultivating 3,000 hectares of cassava farmland out of the expected 29,000 hectares to be cultivated nationwide.
“The Federal Government through the ministry of agriculture has made the cassava farming attractive through the release of loans, grants and critical input to the states.
“Each farmer is expected to cultivate not less than two hectares of farmland to encourage mass production of improvised cassava tubers,’’ Ogunsade said.
He said that the target was for the country to have enough cassava for the production of cassava bread across the country in 2015.
“We have also been assured of 4,000 bags of fertilisers to cassava farmers in Osun in no distant time.
“This time, the government is investing in our farms as processors are also being empowered to buy the tubers from the farmers,” Ogunsade said.
A cassava farmer, Mr Salimon Ibrahim, from Iwo Farms commended the commitment of the Federal Government to the project.
Ibrahim implored the government to equip the processors so that cassava tubers would not go bad in the farms.
Another farmer, Mr Hezekiah Esan, of Oke-Osun Farm Settlement in Osogbo also tasked the government to execute the project to a logical conclusion by creating a ready market for the cassava harvest.
(NAN)