The National Agricultural Seed Council( NASC) has unveiled a five-year institutional strategic plan to provide direction for the agency and revitalize the seed sub-sector of agriculture in Nigeria.
This was disclosed during the public presentation of the document in Abuja on Friday, 13th August 2019.
According to the Director-General of the Agency, Philp Ojo, the plan is aimed at strengthening the capacity of the council in coordinating and regulating the Nigerian seed industry.
Mr. Ojo added that without a comprehensive policy direction, the council, as the apex regulatory body at the center of Nigeria’s seed sector, would face serious challenges in achieving its mandate.
He explained further that NASC is responsible for the regulation of seed production and distribution in the country.
The unveiling was made at the workshop which according to the DG is focused on review and validation of the document by the participants so as to ensure it aligns with the Green Alternative which carries hopes and aspiration of the Nigerian farmers to take the seed sector to the next level for the better.
In his remarks, representative of the Nigeria Economic Summit Group (NESG), Dolapo Enejo, also stated that the strategic plan document will focus on technology and digitization to ensure that smallholder farmers were carried along.
Enejo adverted attention to what is happening currently with the digitization of the agricultural sector. She adjudged the agency as doing great stride in Nigeria.
In her words, Enajo was quoted saying “If you are looking at the Seedcodex today, reviewing and trying to validate the strategy plan, you will see that it is leveraging on technology and leveraging on digitization to ensure that they create a globally competitive economy and to ensure that everyone is carried along; not just the medium and large scale farmers, but the smallholder is the major priority...,”
