Agric & Biotech

The Central Log Control of the Ogun State Ministry of Forestry has uncovered a plot by lumbermen to cart away forest resources from the state through its borders with Ondo State. Commissioner for Forestry, Kolawole Lawal, who made the disclosure recently in Abeokuta, stated that some illegal tree merchants in Laagan, a border village between Ogun and Ondo states, had constructed ...

Syngenta’s Seedcare programme for smallholder farmers in Senegal has led to impressive yield increases, the firm has said. It lists these increases to include those for pearl millet (1.2 t/ha, +40%), sorghum (1.1 t/ha, +86%), maize (2.7 t/ha, +101%), irrigated rice (9.4 t/ha, +11%) and rain-fed rice (2.0 t/ha, +33%). The achievements, from year one of a Syngenta project in ...

The Ogun State Government is finalising plans to establish eco-tourism resort in its forest reserve in an apparent bid to enhance forestry resources and create an alternative means of livelihood for the people of the state. Commissioner for Forestry, Kolawole Lawal, who made this known recently in Abeokuta, the state capital, while speaking with journalists after an interactive session with ...

Once again, stakeholders appear to have brought to the fore, critical issues and concerns of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and the Nigerian Biosafety Management Act 2015. At a daylong gathering in Benin City, Edo State on Wednesday, February 22 2017, participants brainstormed on what they perceive as “the increased aggressive push of the biotechnology companies in partnership with their local ...

The National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) has said that its Director-General / CEO, Dr. Rufus Ebegba, is not a member of the National Inter-Religious Council (NIREC). The agency disclosed in a statement on Friday, February 24 2017 that a media report listing its Dr. Ebegba as a member of the NIREC was untrue. The statement reads: “The Agency wishes to ...

Mankind’s future ability to feed itself is in jeopardy due to intensifying pressures on natural resources, mounting inequality, and the fallout from a changing climate, warns a new FAO report. Though very real and significant progress in reducing global hunger has been achieved over the past 30 years, “expanding food production and economic growth have often come at a heavy ...

Nigeria aims to be a leading light for continent-wide effort to harness the potential of food production to become a significant source of jobs on and off the farm The Nigerian Government in Abuja on Wednesday, February 22 2017 welcomed senior officials from the African Union Commission and agriculture experts from across the continent for an intensive three-day meeting to ...

The Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and the Bogor Agricultural Institute (Institut Pertanian Bogor or IPB) have extended their scientific and technical cooperation for another five years. CIFOR and IPB’s partnership, which started in 1997, contributes to science and development in Indonesia. The new agreement extends the existing bilateral agreement between both institutions through November 2021. The ongoing collaboration ...

A tripartite agreement spare headed by the Dangote Rice Limited to create jobs for 16,000 outgrower rice farmers in Sokoto State in Northwest Nigeria was on Tuesday, February 14 2017 signed amid excitement and a pledge by all parties to ensure the success of the scheme to make the country self sufficient in rice cultivation. The agreement was signed during ...

Failure to act now to make our food systems more resilient to climate change will “seriously compromise” food production in many regions and could doom to failure international efforts to end hunger and extreme poverty by 2030, Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Director-General, José Graziano da Silva, warned on Monday, February 13 2017. “Agriculture holds the key to solving two ...