Prince Ebitimi Amgbare , the Managing Director, Chief Executive Officer, (MD/CEO) Niger Delta Basin Development Authority ( NDBDA) has revealed his plans for rural dwellers in the catchment areas of the agency .
The managing director , chief executive officer of the Basin Authority that is out to ensure massive food production for the three catchment states of Bayelsa, Rivers and Delta states of the Niger Delta region says he want to eradicate poverty from most rural dwellers in the areas of his jurisdiction by making them productive through the provision of farms.
He said his philosophy and.dream has been to provide these farms and personally follow them up for proper output .
Prince Amgbare made the remarks when he granted audience to the management of a news magazine, “Transformation Digest” led by the publisher, Prof. Opuala Charles recently said his dream has been to create active farming communities to rescue dwellers out of poverty .
To achieve this , Prince Amgbare has embarked on not only campaigns for partnership with reputable investors that have shown interest and responded positively but has also reached out to most community dwellers in the catchment areas to form corporatives through which they would participate and carry out various food production chains of the agency .
“My philosophy and dream are to eradicate poverty, to get the ordinary people to become productive .
” I want to see more people through the Ndbda, to create more vibrant farming communities .
“We look forward to where communities can hold strong farms , the Songhai farm system where nothing is a waste, functional farms”
“We want to know the kind of farming and fishing each community will do .It’s hand – on, not stater pack system” added.
Prince Amgbare who has made so much impact on Peremabiri Rice Farmers Association (PRFA) since he assumed office .
Revealing how it won’t be business as usual and to achieve the desired
result , the MD/CEO said “I will follow you to the farm and see what you can do , I support you in doing it better . Be it Poultry,fishing, etc. There will be peace., and.poverty would be a thing of the past in most communities”.
“An advocate against Open Defecation, he also spoke on the need to campaign against the menace in most riverine communities. This age long practice , he says , does not befit the people in this civilised age, and need to stop it .
“No to open defecation.We are concerned of keeping the river safe because that practice portray the people in bad light.Hence the need to campaign against it
“Open defication does not portray us well we must campaign to stop it.We are going to see tangible results in the three advocacy points” he added.
He also disclosed that a major factor that informed the birth of the Public Private Partnership (PPP) in the Ndbda was aimed at collaborating with willing investors to fund large scale agriculture products.
He noted that allocations for the agency may not meet the envisioned large scale funding requirements.
” The envelop system cannot deliver food security.That is why we are thinking out of the box and coming up with PPP and other ways of delivering our mandate” , he stated.
“Sometimes , a project that would require N700m you will get N25m in the budget . How many years will it take to complete this . That’s is where we seek partners and state governments”, he disclosed , and applauded President Tinubu for the commercialisation of agriculture,pointing out that ” we are drawing inspiration from the president who asked us to comercialise agriculture.”