Women farmers in Bauchi State have expressed worry that the distribution of expired agricultural inputs may hinder bumper harvest envisaged under the Anchor Borrowers Programme.

This was contained in a communiqué issued at the end of a one-day budget tracking meeting of women farmers organised by Fahimta Women and Youth Development Initiative Bauchi in partnership with Action-aid Nigeria.

According to the communiqué, women farmers also identified late distribution of inputs such as high yielding seeds, fertilizers and insecticides as other major factors that could frustrate farmers’ efforts to boost both rain fed and dry season farming in Bauchi State.

Two of the women farmers, Rifkatu Magaji from Warji LGA and Rhoda Haruna from Bogoro LGA, said some of the seeds distributed in their communities were not high yielding varieties, alleging that crops that were slated for maturity within three months might take longer time to mature.

Other women farmers in their earlier request for the training and retraining of more extension workers while those already in existence within the communities should be given logistic support to advice farmers on modern farming methods.

On agricultural loan scheme, most women farmers complained of delay in the disbursement of loans which was always granted farmers in July as against March/April.

A lone voice, Malama Iyaji Shehu from Kwagal in Kirfi LGA of Bauchi State said women farmers’ group in Kwagal Community had never benefitted from such schemes.

Earlier in her remarks, the Executive Director of Fahimta, Hajia Maryam Garba, urged the Bauchi State Ministry of Agriculture to always consider women farmers’ groups in the rural areas while disbursing agric loans.

Also speaking, the Acting Director, Research and Statistics in the Bauchi Ministry of Agriculture, Mr. Ishaya Ayuba, advised Bauchi based NGOs to always base their budget analysis on actual amount approved and released and not on proposed budget. (Peoples Daily)