A Savannah Regional-based non-governmental organisation (NGO), the Centre for Rural Improvement Services (CRIS), with support from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), has restored 15 hectares of degraded farmlands under sustainable land management through an agroforestry plantation project in Sawla-Tuna-Kalba District in the Savannah Region.
The one-year programme, which includes beekeeping, is being funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) through its Global Environmental Facility Small Grants Programme for two beneficiary communities, Dakompilayiri and Kunkuya.
The Executive Director of CRIS, Amos Seidu, disclosed this during the launch of the project at Dakompilayiri, a suburb of Tuna.
He said his outfit has distributed one thousand five hundred and twenty cashew seedlings as part of the project to some sixty farmers, mostly women in agroforestry plantations and livelihood empowerment.
He said the project will further provide 60 women with beehives to venture into beekeeping.
“We aim to uplift the living standards of the people, with much focus on women's empowerment.
We are interested in your (farmers) rapid growth, and the Agricultural Department at the district level will also teach you how to prepare and compose manure and practice good agricultural cultural practices that will enrich the farms, he said.
Mr. Seidu reiterated his passion for women’s growth and is optimistic that the programme will go a long way towards propelling their economic advancement to the benefit of the two communities.
The Sawla-Tuna-Kalba District Director of Food and Agriculture, Mohammed Shuraz, assured his office’s willingness to continue to provide technical support for the successful completion of the project.
“I assured you, chief and elders here, that my office will work with you 24/7 with our doors opened to partner CRIS to regain our lost land fertility and not to wait after we have gone for the next generation to come and say, look, our fathers and mothers have come and destroyed the lands and are gone,” he indicated.
A farmer, Khadijah Issahaku, on behalf of her colleagues, thanked UNDP and its partners for the initiative.
“We don’t have land anywhere apart from what is here. But they were those used by our great-grandparents and handed over to our parents, and now us. So, until we add fertiliser, we will not harvest, but how many of us can afford the price of fertiliser? So, we thank UNDP and its partners for coming with this support," she said.
The Sawla-Tuna-Kalba District Works Engineer, Chrys Aada, who launched the project on behalf of the District Chief Executive, Hajia Barikisu Losina Watara, commended UNDP for their support and urged farmers to take the project seriously.
Source: Adom Online , myjoyonline
