The Chinese Government has built a $6billion Agriculture Development Centre to support Nigerian farmers and expose them to global best practices in agriculture productions value chain.
Officials of the Chinese Mission in Nigeria note that the facility is expected to serve as a skills acquisition centre to help local farmers adopt new farming methods which will enable them plant and harvest products that can compete favourably in the international markets.
Though Nigeria as a country is richly blessed with fertile vast land and a large productive age population, but poor infrastructure, lack of funds, absence of modern storage and processing facilities, insecurity and climate change as well as wrong investment policies and programmes have remained set backs in attaining domestic food sufficiency and the standards required to market Nigeria's products at the international levels.
Now, China, an agrarian society which achieved food sufficiency in the 1970s has come to support Africa's most populous nation to revolutionize her agriculture sector, through initiatives that will make her produce competitive at the international market.
The project which was started in 2013 by the Chinese government is expected to help Nigeria adopt modern agriculture techniques to enable the country attain food sufficiency and increase foreign exchange earnings through export of produce.
The centre can boast of World class facilities that covers the entire agriculture value chain, ranging from mechanisation, quality of seedlings, use of technology to information and research in different areas and fields of agriculture businesses.
Nigerian Ministry of Agriculture officials who undertook a tour of the centre while praising the Chinese government for the quality and sophistication of facilities at the over $6million Agriculture Development Centre, however assured that the signature project will further strengthen the Nigeria-China relations for mutual benefits.
