By Yakubu Abubukar Gwagwarwa
The Kano State Agro-Pastoral Development Project, KSADP, has commenced the distribution of agricultural machines and equipment to smallholder farmers across the forty-four local government areas of Kano State.
The initiative, implemented by the Sasakawa Africa Association and funded by the Kano State Government, the Islamic Development Bank, and the Lives and Livelihoods Fund, was flagged off on Wednesday at one of the project’s storage facilities in Kano.
Addressing journalists at the event, the Project Coordinator, Comrade Abdulrasheed Kofar Mata, said the exercise is part of the project’s tradition of engaging the media through annual field days aimed at showcasing progress and interacting directly with farming communities.
KSADP – Sasakawa Marks Final Media Field Day, Showcases Major Gains in Agricultural Transformation
He explained that the Mega Media Field Day—an annual activity of Sasakawa—was expanded under KSADP due to the scale of interventions and the need to properly document achievements recorded across the state.
According to him, the project has procured ninety-eight tractors complete with trailers, ploughs and harrows. Ten have already been commissioned at the mechanisation centre, eight were presented during the flag-off, while the remaining eighty will be distributed across other centres and communities.
In addition, the project is distributing four hundred and ten mini tractors, one hundred and sixty multi-crop reapers, one hundred and fifty maize reapers, and one hundred rice reapers, all aimed at boosting productivity and reducing manual labour among smallholder farmers.
Comrade Kofar Mata also highlighted the distribution of solar-powered irrigation pumps, describing them as one of the most impactful interventions of the project. He said one thousand six hundred pumps have already been distributed, with an additional one thousand nine hundred now being rolled out, bringing the total to about three thousand five hundred by the end of the project.
On his part, the Kano State Coordinator of KSADP, Alhaji Ibrahim Garba Muhammad, noted that the items on display represent only a portion of the project’s wide-ranging interventions.
He outlined key achievements which include the construction of one hundred milk collection centres at a cost of over six billion naira, twenty modern slaughterhouses worth more than two billion naira, grazing reserves valued at over three billion naira, irrigation development projects at Watari and Kabo costing five billion naira, as well as a four-billion-naira farming support scheme for vulnerable households.
Other achievements include rural road projects valued at nine-point-nine billion naira, upgraded cattle markets, and several capacity-building, scholarship, and pastoralist empowerment programmes.
Beneficiaries who spoke to Radio Nigeria expressed deep appreciation for the support.
Umar Hassan Gora from Minjibir Local Government said the intervention would greatly enhance his farming activities.
Nazifi Ado from Doguwa commended the project for extending what he described as life-changing assistance to farmers.
A widow, Mairo Inuwa, who received a rice thresher, said the support came at a difficult time for her family and has now become a lifeline.
Another beneficiary, Umar Surajo Sani, who received a solar water pump, said the intervention had reduced irrigation costs and would boost his dry-season productivity.
