Kwara State is in the forefront in commercial agriculture in Nigeria. What we are looking at is to transfer the gains from the commercial agriculture in Tsonga under the Zimbabwe Farmers to the local farmers.

We have recorded two major achievements with the coming of the Zimbabwe farmers, or new Nigerian farmers as they are called. Firstly, we have made it known to people that commercial agriculture is probable and achievable in Nigeria. Secondly, yields that are well above national average are achievable for most of our crops.

We have been able to demonstrate with cassava, soya beans, maize, and rice and now we are more into the concept of value change. A process of complete packaging before selling to the market is on.

We mean value must be added to products and what we have done is what we call 'up takes demand driving activities' introduced by this government. This means before a farmer can partner with the government, he has the idea of what he is going to produce in terms of product and before he does that he has already related with the market.

He knows who to sell to etc. After that we support the farmers with seedlings, chemicals and fertilizer so that he will get good yields and sell to up-takers who in turn pays into the bank where the loan content of that money is removed and give the remaining to the farmers.

As I am talking to you, the programme has not been able to commence because of some hitches. We are test-running it for this planting season. We tried to amend the leakages and challenges and by next season it will start in earnest.

What are these challenges?

You know in Nigeria generally one of the problems we have is statistic data base. To address this we have conducted farmers census which we based our planning on, but going back to the data, we realized that there are some areas we need to amend.

This includes names that are not real farmers. That is those without farms to show and yet their names on the list. The census came due to support to the farmers by the state government.

This happens in terms of the tractors supply scheme, where government gave farmers tractors with 50 percent rebate and spread the rest payment over time. But up till now most of these tractors have not been paid for and we have to retrieve them.

So, what we are working on is this data base. We need to take agriculture as a business. And now that planting season is almost gone, we will try to salvage the little we can.

Another thing is the issue of infrastructure. We need to do roads to these farms so that people can go and bring out these produce. We have farms that are distant but without roads. In fact some are with foot part and by the time you get into the farms, you see the level of produce there.

We need to start planning our roads according to these settlements so that more products can be brought out daily. In fact, government is putting this into consideration for next year's budget.

Recently, the federal government tagged Kwara State as agriculture based state, of what benefit is that to the ordinary farmer?

Kwarans should take advantage of all these. As I am talking to you, we already have foreign investors who are ready to key into the agricultural transformation of the state.

I thank the federal government for the opportunity given the state under which we have been able to do more things.

Last week we were in Shonga, where we have the highest yields in Nigeria to launch a new agricultural scheme project, which is a very good thing for us. We are equally ready to sit together with the federal government in planning for a smoother season next year.