Agriculture, Education
AN agriculture economist, Mr Abiodun Ajewole, on Friday, proposed the inclusion of “Agropreneurship 101” as one of the agriculture courses in the nation’s tertiary educational institutions.
Ajewole who is the Chief Executive Officer, Landfill Farms, Ijero-Ekiti, made the call while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ado-Ekiti, Ekiti.
The Food and Agriculture Organisation advisor explains that the proposed “Agropreneurship 101” is a new course for fresh students, which focuses on promoting agriculture as a veritable business entity.
The course highlights the teaching of agriculture as a business and facilitates the emergence of young entrepreneurs in agriculture with an acquired professional business approach.
Ajewole said such intervention became necessary to involve the youth in agricultural transformation through “agri-partnership’’ and ensure the desired transformation in the sector.
He expressed the need for modification in the way agriculture was being taught in schools in the country.
Ajewole said such development was also critical in achieving the Federal Government’s desire toward diversifying the nation’s economy from oil dependence to agriculture.
According to him, such intervention would also help to arouse the interest of female students in aligning with their male counterparts in embracing agriculture as a course, profession and vocation.
“This will also help to erase to a greater extent, the negative widespread cultural belief relegating agriculture practice as an exclusive preserve of the menfolk,” Ajewole said.
He called for an increase in the inter-trade relationships among African countries to unlock the continent’s agricultural potentials and develop the sector.
According to Ajewole, such development would avail farmers improved access to global markets and provide large scale and medium farmers with incentives for greater investment and returns.
He listed other advantages of the inter-trade relationships as empowering farmers with market price information that would enable them to improve on price discovery, price negotiation, and reduction in post–harvest losses.
Ajewole noted that over 1.3 billion metric tonnes of food were wasted globally every year.
“Sub-Sahara Africa loses 4 billion Dollars’ worth of grains annually, which is enough to feed close to 50 million people.
“Rural food waste and urban scarcity cannot lead to economic prosperity.
“We need to increase the inter-trade relationship of African countries to address the perennial food insufficiency challenges,’’ he said. (NAN)
Feb. 19, 2021 @ 13 :54 PM |
Tags: Agric. economist proposes ‘’Agropreneurship 101’’ course in nation’s tertiary institutions
