The Imo State Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security, Chief Longers Anyanwu, has warned that the Agricultural Development Programme (ADP) is on the verge of extinction if urgent action is not taken to save the agency.
Anyanwu made this statement during a meeting with the General Manager and the management team of the Imo State Agricultural Development Programme at his office in the State Secretariat complex on Port Harcourt Road, Owerri.
The Commissioner expressed his disappointment over the current state of the agency, describing it as a mere shadow of the ADP he nurtured during his first tenure as Commissioner.
He said: “Imo ADP is on the threshold of going into extinction if nothing very urgent is done to save the Agency”.
The Commissioner recalled that the Agency came first throughout the country during his first mission in the Ministry, especially in the FADAMA Programmes.
Anyanwu, while identifying Agriculture as an integral part of rural development, pointed out that carrying out Agricultural activities in the rural areas would go a long way to developing such areas as well as check insecurity.
He went further to stress that if the bushes in the rural areas could be adequately utilised for Agricultural purposes, there would be no hiding place for hoodlums to operate from.
He, however, suggested that if farm inputs/implements were given to the hoodlums in the bush, they could engage in massive crop production and drop their arms.
The Commissioner charged the GM of Imo ADP and his team to get a full documentary of all ADP lands grabbed and their locations as well as come up with innovations that can help revamp the Agency.
He said: “the Imo State Agricultural Development Programme, ADP, is a parastatal under the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security”.
Earlier in his speech, General Manager of the Imo ADP, Dr Jones Uzoka said they were in the office of the Hon. Commissioner on a familiarisation visit as well as to present some of the challenges of the Agency to the Commissioner.
Dr. Uzoka outlined some of the problems of the Agency, ranging from non-payment of counterpart funding since 2011, loss of ADP lands to land grabbers, loss of World Bank-trained staff to lack of staff to enforce aggressive agricultural revolution.
Adding his voice, the Agency Permanent Secretary in the Ministry, Dr. Alexander Onwumere, said he had gone to Imo ADP to see things for himself and described what he saw as worrisome.
According to him, Imo ADP could go moribund if nothing urgent is done to save the Agency.