Boosting food production without using cutlasses, hoes

By Seye Adeniyi - updated: Friday 26-06-2009

The multipurpose farm machine.IT is obvious that Nigeria is blessed with abundant fertile land for agriculture, but hampered by the fact that most of our farmers depend on cutlasses and hoes for farming, a system that is outdated for this century.

We have the land, men and women to produce enough food for our nation and even export to other countries if we can imbibe mechanized farming.

However, for youths who are planning or nursing the ambition of going into crop production but does not know how to start, here is good news for them.

Also, if you belong to the category of Nigerians with the belief that farming is indeed profitable but with much difficulties, especially with the use of traditional tools, which most of our grand parents used during their time, yet, they could not increase the food capacity of the country, this story is for you.

Not only that, if you are a retiree with the strong urge to invest your gratuity on farming but your major concern is that you dread using hoes and cutlasses to practise the profession especially now that you are of age, you don’t have to exercise any fear again because there is now a better way of being a rich farmer with which many experts considered their use as stressful and not actually promoting abundance food production.

This old practice also has a direct link with backache, body and joint pains, as well as accelerate ageing processes, tiredness and fatigue in many farmers.

Mr. Emmanuel Kayode Ojo, a practising farmer who believe so much in mechanised farming as the only panacea to abundant food production in Nigeria has admonished practising farmers to look beyond using cutlasses and hoes, adding that if the country is to attain the level of becoming food sufficient and secured, then farmers must be willing to change their age-long belief that only the use of these traditional equipment can guarantee success and fortune.

Speaking with Tribune Agriculture on what can be done to cushion the effects of the on-going global food crisis which has resulted in the high prices of food commodities and other consumables in the market, the director of Emmako Investment Nigeria Limited, Ibadan, Oyo State, a company that deals with the manufacture and importation of modern, affordable mechanised small farm machines and other agricultural equipment explained that developing countries like Nigeria is feeling the heat of global food crisis because there is no proper preparation for the unexpected events like this, unlike the developed countries of the world, which have plans for any unforeseen circumstances and future emergence like food crisis.

He also lamented the lack of modern agricultural storage facilities which he said are needed if we don’t want to be spending millions of naira on food importation.

On how the country can get to the level of food security, especially now that President Umaru Yar’Adua is determined at acheving hundred per cent success in the implementation of the administration’s Seven-Point Agenda with attainment of food security as one of the cardinal programmes, Mr. Ojo who is the sole representative of a Chinese company producing the multipurpose farm machine said it is possible to increase the food production capacity of the country, provided farmers are educated on the adoption of modern farm equipment like the multipurpose farm machine.

“We don’t need to deceive ourselves, we would continue to complain about prices of agricultural produces, especially food items, if our farmers stick to only cutlasses and hoes. Honestly, addiction to cutlasses and hoes without the adoption of mechanised farm equipments like the new multipurpose farm machine of removing drudgery and other problems associated with farming cannot solve our problems,” he stated.

On what is special about the modern multipurpose farm machine that experts are now encouraging farmers to adopt, he said unlike tractor, which cost millions of naira, the multipurpose farm machine perform multipurpose funtions, including weeding, making of ridges, planting of seeds, tilling of soil, field clearing, harrowing and other valuable works and it is very affordable for any farmer.

“Ït is obvious that the country is blessed with abundant fertile land for agriculture, but hampered by the fact that most of our farmers are addicted to hoes and cutlasses for farming. This system is outdated for this century. No country in the world still believe that cutlasses and hoes can get them to the “promised land” as far as abundance food production is concerned,” he emphasised.

Asked to comment on the advantage of the multipurpose farm machine to the age long profession (agriculture), an agricultural engineer, Mr. Oluwole Ojomo, told Tribune Agriculture that it is a welcome development that is expected to have made debut into the country’s agricultural sector.

According to him, the farm machine is a Chinese technology that is popular and common in many developed nations of the world and its use has contributed immensely to the increase in food production in such nations with the additional benefits of being affordable, cost effective and rugged, unlike many other modern farm equipment.

The machine, he further enlightened, will help to increase farm output and efficiency of agricultural production; boost production for industrial sector and increase earnings for export crops, help to shift from hand tools to the use of mechanised implements, as well as help in generating employment for thousands of youths at this time of global financial meltdown, aside the fact that farmers can operate it by themselves without requiring the services of experts.

For Mr. Koyejo Owolabi, a cassava and maize farmer who said he had the opportunity of seeing the multipurpose farm mechine in South Africa during his recent visit to some farms, he advised Nigerian farmers to adopt it, stressing that farmers can even form themselves into groups to make it easier to get it. He also tasked state and local government administrators in Nigeria to help farmers in getting this multipurpose farm machines and assist jobless youths to acquire it rather than distributing Okada (motorcycles) to jobless youths under the disguise of youths empowerment when it is obvious that this is not contributing to food production.

Also, on the advantages of this newly-introduced multipurpose farm machine into the country’s agricultural sector, a farmer cum architect, Deacon Tunde Makinde, said farmers in the country should move to the next level in agricultural practices, hence, the need to embrace the affordable multipurpose farm machine, in view of the fact that labourers are hard to come by now and it will also impact positively on our farming system.

In conclusion, Mr. Ojo, however, enjoined many young school leavers to embrace agriculture, stressing that, “there is no point denying the fact that riding of okada by youths cannot solve the nation’s socio-economic problems. Many young people who are interested in farming have migrated to the cities because of the difficulty in using cutlasses and hoes with the attendant effects of low returns.

But with this operate -it - yourself multipuropose farm machine, hundreds of jobless youths will be gainfully employed and there will be movement of people from the cities back to the villages.

Farmers can also use the machine to cultivate swampy areas to produce rice in abundance coupled with other farm produces. “Nigeria is the largest importer of rice in the world, whereas, our land is adequate for the production of all types of rice, if we can adopt this machine,” he concluded.