The Federal Government, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and other stakeholders have intensified efforts to deploy Artificial Intelligence (AI)-enabled digital extension services across Nigeria’s agricultural value chains.
The stakeholders made the commitment at a workshop on “Leveraging Artificial Intelligence in Digital Extension Across Agricultural Value Chains in Nigeria”, held on Wednesday in Abuja.
The initiative, organised under the UN Joint Programme on Agri-Food System Transformation and Innovation in Nigeria (AFTI), seeks to use digital technologies to improve farmers’ access to timely and relevant agricultural advisory services.
IFAD Country Director, Dede Ekoue, said AI-enabled digital extension was strategically important to Nigeria’s agrifood systems transformation because it could translate national agricultural policies into practical services for farmers.
Ekoue said the technology could improve the timeliness and relevance of advisory messages by tailoring information to farmers’ locations, crops, seasons, weather conditions, pest and disease risks, market opportunities and individual profiles.
“AI-enabled digital extension is strategically important for accelerating Nigeria’s agrifood systems transformation.
“It offers a practical pathway for transforming national policy priorities into farmer-level advisory services, stronger value chain performance, improved food security and nutrition, climate resilience and inclusive agro-industrialisation,” she said.
National Project Coordinator of the Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones (SAPZ) Programme, Dr Kabir Yusuf, said the adoption of AI had become necessary given the severe shortage of agricultural extension workers in Nigeria.
Yusuf said the country’s extension worker-to-farmer ratio ranged between one agent to 5,000 farmers and one to 10,000 farmers, far above the commonly referenced benchmark of one extension worker to between 800 and 1,000 farmers.
He said farmers continued to lose yields, quality and income because of problems that could have been prevented through timely agricultural advice.
“The question before us is not whether artificial intelligence belongs in agricultural extension. It is how we make it work for the farmer who needs it most,” Yusuf said.
He disclosed that the SAPZ programme, working with Digital Green, had deployed the FarmerChat AI advisory platform in Kano and Ogun States for farmer registration, verification and monitoring.
According to him, the platform provides weather updates, planting advice and pest and disease guidance in Hausa and English through text, voice and images.
Yusuf said the project targeted 24,000 farmers and had onboarded 20,899, representing about 87 per cent of the target, with 14,895 farmers in Kano and 6,004 in Ogun.
He added that women accounted for 7,665 beneficiaries, representing roughly 37 per cent of farmers, while 233 extension agents, farmer champions and programme personnel were trained against the initial target of 220.
He said the experience demonstrated that AI should complement rather than replace extension agents.
“Our assessment is that about 30 per cent of this work is technology; the other 70 per cent is human facilitation,” he said.
Yusuf also stressed the need for agricultural advisory content generated through AI to be validated by Nigerian institutions, including the Federal Department of Agricultural Extension Services and relevant research institutes, to ensure that recommendations reflect local agro-ecological realities.
He identified smartphone ownership, internet connectivity, high data costs, unreliable electricity, low digital literacy and language barriers as major challenges limiting wider adoption.
He said deliberate mobilisation had also proved important for inclusion, noting that women represented nearly half of beneficiaries in Ogun, compared with about 32 per cent in Kano.
Yusuf commended the Federal Government’s National Electronic Extension Platform and National Digital Farmers Registry, saying their integration with AI advisory services, validated agricultural content and responsible data governance would support the objectives of the National Agricultural Technology and Innovation Policy (NATIP) and the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) Kampala agenda.