Israel To Train 1000 Rice Farmers In Cross River State

Israel will train 1000 rice farmers from Cross River State on modern farming techniques, following the signing of a pact between both parties.

Governor Ben Ayade signed the pact on behalf of the State as he noted that the move is to make the South-South State the leading producer of rice in the country.

Ayade who spoke at an orientation exercise for the farmers at the Ayade Industrial Park, Calabar, said Cross River is committed to empowering farmers with the right skills.

“Today’s exercise is to announce to the world that Cross River is fully prepared to become number one rice producer in Nigeria with the training and equipping of over 1000 farmers with 21st-century farming skills in the first phase of the training progamme,” the governor added.

According to him, “I brought experts from Israel to train us and allow us to have the full benefit of our rice factory that we have set up here for maximal benefits to the citizenry.”

He added that “By the time we are done training the 12, 000 rice farmers so far identified, Cross River will become number one and self-sufficient in rice production in Nigeria.”

In addition, he said “I come with all sincerity of purpose because it is not in my nature to play politics with anything I do for the people.

“My politics has ethics and in ethics, we have attitude and morality comes first.

“Today, as a state, we have the highest number of factories and industries set up in Nigeria since 2015.

“We don’t have the highest allocation, we are actually second to the last but we are number one in everything because we don’t mix politics with what we do here.”