Insecurity: N20b Agric Equipment Wasting in Borno, says Alibe Babagana

Despite all plans by the Borno State Ministry of Agriculture (BSMA) to ensure migration of farmers from subsistence farming to mechanized towards food security and commercialization, insecurity has been a major challenge as equipment worth Twenty billion Naira (N20b) are lying in waste without being deplored into commercial use for food production for productivity.

This was disclosed by Engr. Alibe Babagana, a director in charge of heavy duty machinery and workshop, Bornu state, and who was among the newly conferred fellows into the Nigerian Institute of Agricultural Engineers (NIAE) in an exclusive interview with Food Farm News in Abuja last week Friday.

Babagana revealed that agricultural mechanization authority of the state has all it takes to make Borno the food basket of the nation, looking at the numbers of equipments availability on ground to ensure commercial food production which has been halted due to insecurity in the state.

The newly inducted Engineer said that “we have a lot of machineries and equipment worth 20 billion naira right now in our workshop as i am talking with you now, but due to insecurity in the country, and the state in particular the use of these machines have been hindered and therefore affect the quantity of food the state will have been producing’’