The world currently faces multiple problems of food scarcity, global warming and low pricing of crude oil. The agriculture sector has a huge potential to create jobs but needs a boost in its image to attract more young people. To do this, the SKYE programme in partnership with FarmAgric Foundation is holding relevant agriculture education and training using the Farmer Business School (FBS) methodology; a participatory action learning process involves group participation in agricultural value chains.
The partnership’s Agricultural Skills Acquisition Project (ASAP) started in January 2020 and will run throughout the year. The ASAP training is spilt into three training modules in a 4-week training block. The project targets 500 young Nigerians around Abuja in skills and knowledge through theoretical and practical agricultural training.
The first training module was on the Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), which is simply defined as ‘doing things well and guaranteeing it has been done so’. This attracted 220 participants who were trained, assessed and graduated as the first cohort of this training block.
The top performers during the training sessions will be incubated on a farm where they will have the chance to practice what they have been taught.
