TETFUND-funded regional centre to partner NGOs on integrated farming

The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) Centre of Excellence in Integrated Farming Systems (TCoEIFS), Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi, is to partner Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and other relevant bodies on integrated farming system.

Dr. Kolawole Richards, Director of the centre, reiterated this commitment at the inaugural meeting of the staff of the Centre, weekend in Bauchi.

He said that the Centre was ready to partner government, NGOs and other relevant bodies in providing short term training, skills and certification in integrated farming systems.

Richards said: ”the Centre had since swung into action, in order to meet the basic readiness specifications of the TETFUND.

“With visits to organisations within Bauchi state and the entire North-East sub-region, with proposals for collaborations in smart agriculture, this is the future of the agricultural value chain globally.”

He added that the centre had assembled a crop of professionals that would serve as its Technical Advisory Committee.

“That will be in charge of providing directions to be taken in fisheries, animal husbandry, nutrition and dietetics, as well as post-harvest technology,” he added.

On his part, Dr Aliyu Gaidam, Deputy Director of the centre, said, ”to be more resourceful, its activities would revolve around the triple helix model.

“That would seek to bring together academia, government and industry, for the overall socio-economic development of the society.”

He added that the kind of interventions to be expected from the centre would be such that it will expose trainees to the practical rudiments of an integrated farming system, instead of the theoretical approach.

Our correspondent reports that the TETFUND gave its approval for the siting of its centre of Excellence for the North East at the Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi.

The centre is poised to lead its contemporaries in the region in initiating problems-solving researches for the economic development of the region and the country at large.