WOFAN scales up to Agric Mechanization to Mark world food day with rural women and youths in 7 states of Nigeria:

It was joyous moment for over 1200 smallholder male and female farmers in the indigenous communities of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja, on Thursday, October 16th 2020, as the Women Farmers Advancement Network (WOFAN) distributed rice reapers, threshers and handheld motorized rice cutters to 120 clusters to commemorate the Day of the Rural woman and the World Food Day 2020.

During the equipment handing over ceremony, which was in furtherance of the WOFAN’s sustained drive, through a new ICON of Hope project, to mitigate the hardships of rural and improve their socio-economic wellbeing, at least 10 farmer groups from Kwali, Gwagwalada, Bwari and Zuba areas carted away the machines to upscale their farming activities.
Speaking on the WOFAN’s intervention, which was organized to mark the 2020 World Food Day and Rural Woman Day, Hajia Garba said WOFAN’s move to promote mechanization in rice and groundnut farming across seven states in the country and the FCT was aimed at reducing smallholder farmers’ hardships associated with the use of traditional methods of farming and increasing their yields with the adoption of modern technological tools.
The WOFAN leader enthused: “Today, the distribution of the equipment and machines to the farmers after training on use and maintenance of the machines is another milestone in WOFAN’s sustained efforts to impact on the lives and activities of rural farmers to mark the Rural Women and World Food Day which encourages awareness of sustainable agricultural practices and celebrating ‘Food Heroes’ who of course are women and are each day sacrificing all resources at their disposal to provide food for the world even during the COVID 19 PANDEMIC.

“We, therefore, hope that the smallholder farmers especially women, will take advantage of the opportunities availed by this intervention to improve their lot and encourage us to replicate this intervention in other local government areas of the FCT”, Hajia Garba added.
Commenting on the support by WOFAN, the RIFAN FCT Women leader, Hajia Asmau Yusuf, had expressed the farmer groups and community’s appreciation to WOFAN and all Funding and Technical support partners and assured then that farmers in Gwagwalada Area Council would operate the machines with utmost care , revolve the funds generated from the use of the machine and maintain them in order to achieve the objectives and even scale up the project in the community.
In his remarks, one of the farmer groups’ leaders from Kwali Area Council, Mr. Suleiman Abubakar, said: “We were harvesting a hectare of rice farm for about 5 days with 20 man-labor but with this machine, a hectare can be harvested is just 1-2 hours””. We are therefore very grateful to the WOFAN and its entire working team for this kind support. “” We have never experienced this type of support before from either any other agency or this serves as a dream come true to all the farmers. On behalf of all farmers in targeted in this project, I want to assure the WOFAN team that we will take good care of these machines to boost our productivity and ensure the success of the ICON of Hope project.”

Similarly, the leader of TsinTsinga Women Farmers Association, Zuba, Hajia Hadiza Shuaibu, thanked the WOFAN leader, Hajia Salamatu Garba, “for thinking about us as women farmers and giving us these machines to improve our farming activities. We will not disappoint her and will use this equipment carefully to ensure that they are durable so that all our members can improve their yields.”