The University of Ilorin will soon begin mass production of banana and sugarcane following a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) it signed with India.

The Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Abdulganiyu Ambali made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Thursday.

Ambali said that, already, the university had begun to reap the benefits of the various MoUs it signed with other universities in the country, Africa, America and Europe. He explained that the institution signed MoU with a Tissue Culture Laboratory in India, where three lecturers of Unilorin had been trained.

The VC said the lecturers had acquired the needed skills to grow tissue culture for large production of banana and sugarcane. He said efforts were on to train more lecturers in India on tissue culture for sugarcane, adding that this would boost food production in the country.

"We are now growing tissue culture in the university; for example, we have perfected the skills on how to grow banana in the laboratory, which is about to be transferred to the field. "We are also thinking of sending some other set of staff to India, to go and learn tissue culture in sugarcane.

"This would strengthen the already established collaboration with the Sugar Research Institute of Nigeria," Ambali said. He said that the school had built a laboratory and grain house to boost production and effective storage of sugarcane, which would be distributed to farmers.

The partnership, he said, would go a long way in boosting food security and, reducing hunger and unemployment. The vice chancellor said the institution had also keyed into the practice of the International Association of Education to make it a world class institution in learning and manpower development.

He said part of the the policy of the institution was to ensure that the lecturers acquired the needed skills and broadened knowledge. This, he said would enable them to be at par with their counterpart in other parts of the world– hence, the need for exchange programmes. "We have signed a MoU with national universities in the country, MoU with some universities in Africa, Europe and in America.

"The benefit of it is that we continue to exchange ideas in terms of giving our staff the opportunity to be up to date in their knowledge in terms of academic knowledge, skills acquisition, knowing what is going on in various fields. "We have three university staff in the University of Wisconsin in the US.

"They are there to acquire skills on stem cells, a high tech research venture where you grow different parts of human tissues in the laboratory," he said. Ambali said such tissues could be used to treat severe burns, and that with the increasing rate of internal organ diseases, this technology could solve medical challenges in the country.

He also said that the university got 10 per cent of the 2015 Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) Research Grant for institutions. According to him, this is a sign that more can be achieved when training and research is encouraged.

"There is collaboration with the University of Minnesota, they spend some time with the students in sharing skills on how to write grants. "For example in the 2015 TETfund Research grants, University of Ilorin got 10 per cent of the number of grants awarded." (NAN)