From March this year, the Bill Gates Foundation will start the third phase of its programme on animal production in Nigeria with empowerment of one million rural households.
The Nigerian Coordinator of the programme, Prof. Olufunmilayo Adebambo, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday that the third phase would begin with a forum for small-holder farmers in Bayelsa.
Adebambo, Nigeria’s first female Professor of Animal Breeding said that the programme would target bringing out Nigerian households from poverty and giving them improved nutrition using chicken.
“The empowerment will require farmers to be part of a cooperative so they can qualify to obtain loans.
“The farmers will be given tested chicken – which performances are known – to raise, sell off and make money.
“They can eat out of it,’’ Adebambo, who teaches at the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB), said.
She said that the first phase of the animal production programme known as Programme for Emerging Agricultural Research Leaders (PEARL) started in 2014 and ended in September 2016.
“The foundation funded PEARL with about 500,000 U.S. dollars for three years to develop and multiply improved local chicken for Nigeria.