Nigeria - The World Bank has approved Nigeria and 11 other West Africa Countries to benefit from its assisted regional agricultural project, West Africa Agricultural Productivity Programme (WAAPP) worth $300 million. The Countries are Ghana, Mali, Senegal, Cote d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Togo, Benin, Gambia and Niger. A statement from the World Banks country office endorsed by the Senior Communications Officer, Mr. Obadiah Otohomdet explained that Nigeria's share in WAPPP is $51 million out of the $300 million approved for the 12 Countries in the West African sub region.

According to him, "Out of the US$ 51million allocated to Nigeria, US$30 million will come from the ECOWAS sub-region with the balance of US$ 15 million from Nigerian IDA and US$6 million from free grants from the Global Food Crisis Response Programme (GFPR).

Further, he said that the Board of the World Bank had already approved Nigeria's participation in the program which is expected to help Nigeria increase productivity and create direct employment for about 1.5 million Nigerian farmers, especially youths and women.

The Task Team Leader for the Programme, Abdoulaye Toure, leading a team of agricultural experts on the mission to Nigeria noted that the project has started yielding results in some participating African countries such as Mali where technologies developed for rice has increased farm productivity from two to nine tons per hectare while Nigeria's farm productivity currently stands at 2.5 tons per hectare.

The implication is that Nigeria is expected to pay back only the interest-free US$15 million to the IDA in 40 years with a grace period of 10 years. Nigeria contributes between 60-65 percent of ECOWAS funds.

The Task Team Leader, West African Agricultural Productivity Programme, WAAPP further said "Nigeria is expected to play a key role in championing this regional agricultural programme to scale up research and technology adoption to enhance agricultural productivity in the West Africa sub-region. Many of the participating West African countries are looking up to Nigeria for leadership in the project."

While saying that the WAAPP project is expected to assist farmers in agro-processing and value addition for agricultural products, the World Bank recalled that the first phase of the project was approved in 2007 and had since provided Ghana, Senegal and Mali with agricultural research systems and regional research coordination and Monitoring through the West African Council for Agricultural Research and Development.

Although agriculture is a priority for Nigeria towards the attainment of Vision 20-20-20, but reports showed that currently food import bills in Nigeria are high while productivity of Nigeria's agricultural commodities are very low when compared to other countries in the sub-region.

The goal of WAAPP is to encourage integrated development of agricultural research into the Technology Generation and Dissemination continuum throughout the region.

Clement Nwoji

Daily Champion/04/03/2011