By Ìbùkúnolúwa Dàda
A team from UI has announced the date for the training of seventy women and youths on Sustainable System of Organic Vegetable Production to be 7th If August.
The team of five students of the Faculty of Agriculture- all in their final year- won a ‘Student Project Award’ grant on Management of Agroecology and Food Security sponsored by Food Systems Caravan, West Africa on the 22nd of June. The students are Akinlabi Oluwatomide- Agronomy, Adebanjo Oluwatosin- Agronomy; Adisa Jamiu- Agronomy, Raji Sakirat- Agricultural Extension and Rural Development, and Olutayo Oluwatumininu- Agronomy
They were announced winners on the Food Systems Caravan, West Africa official website alongside four other teams in a statement which partly reads: “We are proud to announce the five groups of students that were granted the Student Project Award titled “Students as change makers” organized by the Food Systems Caravan. It was not easy to choose among the high quality student proposals that our team has received, all of them enthusiastically embracing the principles of agroecology and systems thinking. In the end, three projects from Benin and one from Ghana were selected as the winners.”
The Nigerian team proposed to create a Sustainable System of Organic Vegetable Production (SSOV-P). The demand for vegetable production around the Ajibode community at the University of Ibadan has become of increased importance especially when the cultivated lands are overused and are depleted. Hence, this project is aimed to train 70 women and youth on vegetable production using compost which they will make from the agricultural waste generated from within the university community.”
The objectives of the trainingare to manage the agricultural waste generated within this community; to maintain a friendly agro-ecological system contributing to SDG1 (No poverty), SDG2 (zero hunger), SDG8 (decent work and economic growth) and SDG11 (sustainable cities and communities; increase food availability in the project region; and increase income of participating 70 youth and women.
In an interview with them, they noted that the deadline for the application for the training, is 7th of August and the training would start immediately spanning three months, August to October. They also added that they are really happy about this and are keen on having as many women and youths benefit from the grant as materials needed such as leaves for Compost, tools for farming, record books, tags, T-shirts, and many others have been provided.
