By Michael Adeyemo
A governorship aspirant under the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun State, Omooba Dotun Babayemi has in a recent interview harped on the reasons why Osun should be the food basket of the nation.
Babayemi who contested the 2022 governorship primary under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), said if elected, he will start with agriculture. “Osun is primarily an agrarian environment. One of the things that we saw when we went out was how bad things were in the rural areas, especially regarding our rural roads and our feeder roads. We have gone round the extreme of the state, and what we saw was appealing.” he said.
Furthermore, he said “In our hinterlands, if you go to Ife South area, all the way to Ikire, going from there, all the way from Ifetedo, through Ikire, through Ago Owu, all the way to Asejire, the soil that we have there produces Category A cocoa that is recognised globally, we have not done anything with that God given benefits. I’m talking about a distance close to 100 kilometres; there are no roads, only motorcycles can go there. Not just our cash crops, but also regular agricultural products that our farmers grow, whether cassava or maize, 75 per cent of the produce we have in those areas, including cash crops, gets destroyed at the farm because there is no way to get them out. We will look at how we can boost our economy, leveraging the agricultural value chain. If you put the processing industry in any of those areas, the raw materials are already there; we would bring industries that would come to leverage those things. We will not be shipping our raw materials.”
“At the moment, two flyover bridges, worth about N20-25 billion, are being built in Osogbo, where there is no traffic. If you put those funds to use, we can use this to impact the economy, and it will have a direct impact on our IGR. If you move over from that side of the state, and you go to Ejigbo, from Iwo through Ejigbo industrial cities, all the way to Ogbomosho, the soil that we have there produces the best cashew that you can get anywhere; we are not getting anything, there are no benefits to the indigenes of Osun.”
“If you go back to the time past, we had boards, where, irrespective of what happened, the farmers and the indigenes of the state were assured of their revenues. If I put my effort into it, it would bring about these returns.”
“The government’s responsibility is to provide infrastructure and the opportunity for our farmers to be able to thrive. We used to have a Cocoa Board, a Cashew Board; all of these things have disappeared. We have farm settlements in Osun; we have four of them, we have one in Iwo, we have one in Orile Owu, and nothing meaningful is being done, even at the local government level, to be able to support the farmers or put industries that can leverage on the proceeds that they are coming with.”
“Osun should be the food basket of the nation. We are positioned properly to be able to supply food; we are like the nucleus of the Southwest. The distance to Ibadan, with the distance to Lagos, is very short, with the good road network we border Ondo State, we border Ekiti State, the opportunities are many.” he concluded