Jinmi Ajayi

My thoughts on the Comprehensive Intervention Plan for Food Security, Affordability and Sustainability by the Federal Government.

Throwback to a few weeks ago while browsing through the first set of profiles for the mentorship program. By the way we had over 120 applications within 48 hours.

It’s encouraging to see how dedicated young Africans can be even when fighting against the odds. In one of the videos an applicant narrated how hippopotamuses feed on his groundnut farm at night. He must ward off wild animals at night to protect his source of livelihood after going through the hurdles of life during the day.

This is the reality of smallholder farmers who produce about 80% of our food, how then do we get 800 million Africans out of hunger and also attain food sufficiency?

We must ensure our farmers are not isolated. Mapping our farming communities is critical to identifying those who need to be relocated or who only require solutions within their areas of operation. In essence, what we require is consistent dedication.

I am excited for the launch of the inaugural FeedUp Africa Agribusiness Mentorship Programme. Our young farmers possess great potentials and handholding uplifts them from production to value chain expansion.

We must push them out of the ‘smallholder farmer’ narrative towards sustainable wealth creation and position them to improve and replicate same in their areas of operation.

A pathway worth exploring for a food-secure Africa. The mentors have committed to a 2-year period of selflessness to ensure that our first cohort excel. The future is indeed bright. The future is now.

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We are glad to announce the launch of the 2023 FeedUp Africa Agribusiness Mentorship Programme. This 2-Year programme will equip participants with the requisite capacities to grow their business through market access, efficient and sustainable production processes.

My sojourn into agribusiness started almost a decade ago and, I have seen first hand how difficult it is for young African farmers to access resources and knowledge to increase their productivity and income.

This is the gap the FeedUp Africa Mentorship Programme is filling. Handholding our young agribusiness practitioners enables their altruistic potential thus opening up opportunities for growth and investment.

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At FeedUp Africa, we know young farmers and agribusiness practitioners face a myriad of challenges to produce our food. They are faced with poor infrastructure, market access, climate change, lack of funds, post-harvest losses, operational bottlenecks etc.

Mentoring farmers in Africa also helps to build capacity within the agricultural sector and create a more resilient and sustainable agricultural system. By providing agribusiness practitioners with access to resources, training, and guidance, mentoring helps to increase their productivity, while also helping to reduce the risks.

Additionally, mentoring can help farmers to identify and access new markets, leading to increased economic opportunities for the entire community. By providing mentorship and support to farmers in Africa, we can ensure that the continent is able to meet its food needs and continue to grow and develop.

Registration link in bio.

Reports indicate that thousands of farm communities in the states of and have been impacted by flooding. These floods are a major threat to agricultural output for smallholder farmers in coastal areas like Benue and Kogi. Additionally, the movement of soil caused by the floods has led to the ruin of agricultural crops.

The apparent incidence of food shortages and price increases consequent from this scenario is pretty worrying.

It’s a food insecurity emergency that requires even more emergent but strategic state and national action plans to effectively tackle.

While more needs to be done, I am grateful for our tangible wins, the increasingly consistent wins of our armed forces and civil society; visible key infrastructural development that has so far encouraged multimodal transport system; and importantly, visible efforts towards improved power and security.

Nigeria will succeed, so will you and I.

The verdict? Healthy eating is NOT best done as a bandwagon thing. Read till the last slide.