A man who seems to have devoted the rest of his life to promoting efforts to produce in Nigeria has dropped a revelation. Uche Onochie, convener of ‘Make-In-Nigeria’ annual conference series said at the opening ceremony in Port Harcourt that Nigeria and the world are going back to farming, and that the future is in agribusiness.
He tutored the audience mostly of tech youths that everybody is coming back to agriculture because humans must eat, and must eat cheaper.
“Tech is the only method to achieve this goal because tech will help farmers to produce cheaper and create mass production. It will require basic technology, not rocket science.”
He called it smart farming saying it is the new way to go. “The elites must find a type of farming that suits each of them. Its smart farming that will attract the elite and the youth to farming and agribusiness.
“There is wealth in farming. Do not be deceived. 70% of the 210m Nigerians are young people, below 30 years of age. Collaboration is the key, so, no more working in silos.”
He urged the young agripreneurs to insist to be heard and to collaborate, and to focus on SMEs and startups.
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Speaking on the theme of the year, ‘Fusion and Tech’, he said: “We must find a way to eat faster and cheaper. Farmers complaints are mostly about produce not getting to the market, storage problems, logistics, plus problems of tech and linkage.”
He said his team did a hackathon, and that the winner would go home with N1m. This would run for five years, all aimed at getting young people into the agric market, in belonging to a network that will help solve problems. It will focus on farmer-transport-tech-market.
“We need the young people because they are a tech generation. Make-In-Nigeria is trying to ignite the fire of industrialization in Nigeria, just as China, now a world production power, did. Its doable to have Made in Nigeria products.”
Uche Onochie, convener, Make-in-Nigeria annual conference series, PH zone
