Targets agro-processing, export

Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State, yesterday, flagged off the 2026 distribution of fertilisers and other farm inputs to 63,000 registered smallholder farmers in the state.

Mbah also said the move was in line with his administration’s commitment to eradicating poverty and growing Enugu State into a $30 billion economy, noting that 40 per cent of the growth would come from agriculture.

Mbah said his administration had always seen agriculture as more than just a mere source of food, but as big business, hence the efforts to migrate Enugu farmers from subsistence to commercial farming.

“We have done this in the last three years, essentially providing fertilisers, agrochemicals, stems, seeds, and seedlings to improve our yields. Today, we have 63,000 bags of fertilisers. We have to train our farmers.

“We also have to migrate our smallholder farmers from subsistence farming to mechanised farming, which is why we also invested in machinery. And that means that we are going to start thinking about a full value chain.

“We are looking at exports, playing in all the value chains, being able to export fresh produce from here to other parts of the world, being able to process our produce, add value, package, and then export. This is also why the airport concession and cargo terminal are important to us,” he said.

Mbah called on those saddled with the distribution responsibility to ensure that the inputs reach the farmers by sticking to the database, and warned farmers against selling the inputs.

“We are working with our database. We are also going to implore all our stakeholders, the local council chairmen, and the priests in the various communities to ensure that these inputs reach the end users, free of charge. Please make sure these inputs reach our farmers. We do not want middlemen.

“The fertilisers also have ‘Not for Sale’ boldly written on them. So, you must make sure that you use this to scale up our production so that we can have a bumper harvest and drive down the cost of food in Enugu,” he stressed.

He said the Special Agro-Processing Zones, one of the agro-industrialisation initiatives of his administration, would soon come on board to scale up production and cut post-harvest losses.