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Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
At least 35 Benue youths who underwent training in agribusiness investment program organised by the Royaldream Builders Initiative (RBI) in conjunction with the US Embassy, Abuja have benefited from a grant to boost their agribusiness.
The 35 beneficiaries who were presented with cheques at a brief ceremony which took place at the BIPC Guest House, North Bank, in Makurdi, on Tuesday, went home with between N50,000 and N100,000 depending on their type of business.
Speaking at the presentation ceremony, state Deputy Governor, Engr. Benson Abounu restated the commitment of the Samuel Ortom’s administration to support entrepreneurs by facilitating a N2Billion loan through the Bank of Industry.
Abounu who was represented at the occasion by Chief Elijah Aboje, a Senior Special Assistant to the governor encouraged all Benue people to take advantage of such opportunities to grow their businesses.
Also speaking, Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Terkimbi Ikyange commended the RBI and the US Embassy Abuja for finding Benue State worthy of such an impactful project.
Ikyange who promised to provide additional support from the Benue State House of Assembly to scale the project so that farmers in many local governments can benefit from the robust agric training suggested that the beneficiaries can serve as resource persons across communities in the State.
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Earlier in a remark, Project Director, Dr. John Ona disclosed that the goal of the Agribusiness Incubation Program is to equip young educated farmers with business skills and good agric practices so as to reduce the failure rate of young people involved in Agriculture.
He stated that the project started with workshops held in December 2017 across two locations in Makurdi and Otukpo where over 700 participants were trained in Bookeeping and profitability, marketing of produce, value addition and agric funding opportunities.
“Applications for further training were invited from the participants and over 200 applicatiosn were received. After a thorough assessment and interactions with these applicants nearly 100 applications were shortlisted for further training. These were further pruned to 35 beneficiaries who are presented today.”
Ona said the 35 selected trainees were then exposed to intensive farm internship on Good Agricultural practices in poultry, fisheries, piggery, cassava, rice, soybeans and vegetables farming with experts from the University of Agriculture, Makurdi.
Some of the beneficiaries including Dr. Andy Iyaji, Mr. Sokol Kelvin, Miss Wandoo Upev, Mrs. Mimi Dzever and Mr. Joseph Ivom thanked RBI and its partners for finding them worthy of the grant and promised to use the money judiciously to grow their agribusinesses.
