NGO empowers orphans, children

The children, ranging between 9 and 18 years old, were drawn from five communities in the district.

Speaking at the event, the Programme Manager, Mr Nicholas Onoriode, said the training was part of the NGO’s programme to help the youths to become self-reliant.

The children were trained in bead-making, catering, soap-making and welding.

According to him, the programme also aims to help them to generate income to support members of their families as well as improve their living standard.

Onoriode said that the programme was made possible by support received from the organisation’s development partners such as the Institute of Human Virology Nigeria (IHVN), Centre for Disease Control (CDC), the government as well as indigenes of Bwari and its environs.

For his part, Mr Adam Ahamed, the Desk Officer, Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC), Bwari Area Council Secretariat, said that the secretariat identified with what the NGO stood to achieve through its outreach programmes.

He commended the NGO for its outreach programmes, which he said was complementing government’s efforts to support the less privileged.

Also speaking at the event, the Secretary to the District Head of Kurudu, Mr Joel Yakubu, who represented the district head, commended the NGO for the training, saying that such intervention had helped to take the children in the community off the streets.

He also commended the NGO for its “Engine Girls initiative”, which aimed to discourage young girls from prostitution.

The beneficiaries drawn from Daram, Zango, Kurudu, Gaba and Baragoni settlements, are children either orphaned by diseases, susceptible to diseases or school drop-outs.

Also, the Federal Government has renewed its commitment to reduce the use of Tobacco in the country, Dr Osagie Ehanire, the Minister of State for Health, said in Abuja at a public awareness forum on the dangers of tobacco consumption.

The minister said that efforts had been made to implement the National Tobacco Control Act (NTCA) of 2015.

NTCA is a domesticated WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC).

Ehanire said the federal government, in collaboration with Civil Society Organisations, had started mass awareness campaigns on the provisions of NTCA 2015 to create the enabling environment for enforcement.

He said government had reviewed the standard for cigarettes to include the complete ban on cigarettes with characterising flavour, including menthol.

The minister also announced that government had ratified the protocol to eliminate illicit trade in tobacco products, adding that the instrument of accession would be finalised and deposited at the UN headquarters.

According to Ehanire, tobacco farming leads to deforestation due to land clearing and curing of tobacco leaves and also increases land and water contamination due to extensive pesticide use, among others.

Meanwhile, the National Agricultural Seeds Council (NASC) has affirmed its commitment to ensure global best practices in the supply of seeds to farmers to spur Nigeria’s economic diversification efforts through agriculture.

The Director-General of NASC, Dr Philip Ojo, conveyed the commitment in Abuja during a road walk organised to create awareness on the benefits of using and adopting quality improved seeds to farmers.

He said that the council was ready to apply the full weight of the law to address the menace of fake dealers in the seed business space.

The director-general, who described those marketing adulterated seeds as economic saboteurs, urged farmers to always verify the authenticity of the seeds they acquired from the right channel before planting.

“The mission of the NASC is to transform the Nigerian seed industry into a foreign exchange earner, a key employer of labour and a means of wealth creation.

“Today’s road walk is the first of its kind in the history of the Nigerian seed industry. We are hoping that the road march will be replicated in all the six geopolitical zones of the federation to cascade the awareness creation to the grassroots to reach the rural farmers,” he said.

Ojo advised farmers to use quality seeds, instead of grains, so as to boost food production across the country and earn foreign exchange.

Speaking at the event, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh also encouraged farmers and investors who intended to go into agribusiness to prioritise the use of quality seeds and verify the authenticity of the seeds from NASC before planting.

Ogbeh, who was represented by Mr Quadiri Olakekan, a director in the ministry, said good results could not be achieved at the end of the day without the use of quality seeds.

He also warned fake seed dealers to desist from their nefarious act or risk jail term.

For his part, Alhaji Ibrahim Musa, a member of the Board of Trustees of NASC, said that the road walk was organised to sensitise farmers to the differences between quality seeds and grains.

He also said that the sensitisation walk was meant to educate all the citizens on the importance of farming with improved seeds in the effort to boost agricultural productivity in the country.

Mr Yarama Ndipaya, the Executive Director, Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria, said that his agency was happy to partner with NASC in the road walk and called for the sustenance of the activity because of its benefits.

Similarly, the African Union Inter-African Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR) says the beekeeping industry in Africa has contributed to the pollination of over 80 per cent of crops in the continent.

Dr Peter Ithondeka, an official of the bureau, in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja said that the beekeeping industry had contributed a lot to Africa’s economy via crops pollination, honey and beeswax production, among others, adding, however, that the input of beekeeping to the economy varied from one country to another.

“Global honey yield is estimated at 1.5 million tonnes annually, costing over 7 billion dollars, although the industry is still far behind its projected capacity because the potential of the sector is frighteningly huge.

“This is because beekeeping is an important and strategic industry that generates food, employment, environmental conservation and diversification of exports, especially in the wake of the economic predicament facing most African countries.

“The value of the industry for now might not be obvious to the ordinary man on the street but we are getting there,” he added.

Ithondeka stressed that it was a known fact that agricultural growth and crop productivity largely depended on bee pollination services, which also had ecological and agricultural values.

“Apart from crop pollination, the beekeeping industry provides an income for beekeepers and their families, as well as an income for suppliers of beekeeping equipment.

“It also provides goods and services such as honey and wax as well as pollination services and it is growing with experimentation in the commercial rearing of bumblebees and some solitary bee species for the provision of pollination services.

“Bees help communalities beyond pollination and honey production; it helps to prevent elephants from damaging crops in farms in Africa while protecting the people as well,” he said.

Describing bee keeping as a lucrative business, Ithondeka said that some diseases affecting honey bees, such as American and European Foulbrood, small hive beetle infestation and varroosis of honey bees, had hindered honey production in Africa.

He, however, noted that good beehive management, capacity building and education of beekeepers, sound legislation and policies, provision of quarantine measures, residue analyses, honey standards, export of beehive products and beekeeping protocols would help to improve the health of bees.

Ithondeka called on stakeholders in the beekeeping industry to report instances of bee disease to the World Organisation for Animal Health and AU-IBAR.

He said that such reports would not only instigate the Multiple Sclerosis Centre (MS) to bar bee trade internally or internationally but would also open opportunities for assistance and transparency.

Ithondeka reiterated the importance of bees in the ecosystem, quoting Albert Einstein – one of the greatest scientists of the 20th Century– as saying that “If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left’’.

“That, in essence, means no more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals and no more man,” he quipped.