Gombe State Government says it would cultivate a total of 10,000 hectares of cotton in the 2018 farming season across its 11 local government areas.
Malam Musa Umar, chairman, Gombe State Commodity Depot and Exchange Centre, said that the project would be financed by the Nigeria Incentive–Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL).
“NIRSAL has agreed to finance the project, we have even registered the farmers and the state government will be the off takers of the produce. We want to source market for our farmers, give them good price of international standard.” he said.
He said the project would involve 5,000 farmers who would each cultivate two hectares of land.
He lamented that the state had lost its position as the producer of the best cotton in the world, stating however, that efforts were on to save the situation.
“We already know Gombe used to be a cotton belt and in those days we were producing 119,000 metric tonnes of cotton. The Gombe State commodity Depot and Exchange Centre will bring back the lost glory of the state. The centre will also reposition and transform the economic sector of the state’’, he said.
