PROGRAMME

PROGRAMME

The Agribusiness Development and empowerment programme have two components:

1. National Agriprenuership Training Scheme (NATS) – to provide functional knowledge and skill upgrade to start-ups and members of existing cooperative societies/sustainable management and reinforce agricultural export in long term.
2. Product and Marketing Enhancement Scheme (PAMES) – to enhance product development and activate value-chain linkage of Nano, Micro and Small Enterprises to market off-takers.

The programme is to empower the agripreneurs by integrating entrepreneurial skills and knowledge into modern agricultural practices to produce agripreneurs and workforce to cater for agricultural enterprises in Nigeria and beyond. This will in turn address the present problem associated with agricultural production since enterprise development is arguably more sustainable than economic development strategies by business attraction and business retention.

Globally, agriculture is going through a transformation, this transformation is not only enabled by innovative minds and technologies, but the fact that countries are recognizing that agriculture is taking a new dimension and expanding its scope beyond mere cultivation of crops and rearing of animals for the livelihood of rural population. NATS is to bring issues of diversification, value addition, high technology agriculture, agripreneurship, global marketing are gradually getting due attention in redefining agriculture. Farmers who are unaware of scientific agriculture and effective agricultural management system will not cope especially with the recent climate change experienced across the globe. Agripreneurship therefore, is an employment strategy that can lead to self-reliance.

This project goal is set to educate 100 women farmers and marketers of majorly highly perishable farm produce across Nigeria as participants/beneficiaries, who in turn will educate others within the community. Also products produced from each sub - clusters will be seeking international recognition with other brands via the exportation of these products to countries with a high demand of these goods. This project in the long run will help to better the livelihood of these women, their families and the country at large.

Our main training objectives:

1. To support women farmers at the grassroots to make more profit from their farm produce which are highly perishable by adopting our drying/dehydration systems
2. To provide market women of highly perishable farm produce the best and cheapest technology for drying/dehydration before storage and increase in their shelf-life
3. To enable these women process the earlier listed groups of farm produce into powder, chopped or flake after drying/dehydrating is achieved using our drying/dehydration technology
4. To enable these groups of women add value using special packaging sizes/branding before distribution to their target market and in turn make more profit from their investments on highly perishable farm produce

The objective of the training programme is to ensure that trainees learn practical and business management skills on how to start and nurture their agri – businesses investment in the area of food processing technology. The following are therefore the specific objectives of the programme:

1. Expose trainees to the various entrepreneurial opportunities in adopting drying and dehydration technology for food processing business that are viable and self-sustaining;
2. Empowering the women in simple business planning methods which they would use to start up or sustain their ongoing sales of highly perishable farm produce business;
3. Link trainees to mentors that can provide further learning and support services after the training, and
4. Prepare the women for export readiness by training on best global practices for production, branding and packaging.

SUB – OBJECTIVES

1. Encourage all active populace, women and youths to embrace agribusiness development as a viable business option.
2. Strengthen the knowledge and skill gaps of participants of agribusiness development schemes as a platform to facilitate transition to modern and best agricultural practices.
3. Facilitate and encourage networking/experience sharing among beneficiaries and foreign peers for value addition and inclusive value chain development.
4. Support real diversification of economy away from crude and adopt agriculture as non-oil boom.
5. Promote and enhance export earnings in agricultural value-chain

What will participants Learn?

1. How to effectively and efficiently allocate agribusiness resources;
2. How to discover SMART ideas in agribusiness ecosystem
3. How to source and maintain farm equipment and machinery
4. How to enhance sales through product ping and branding
5. How to minimize losses in agribusiness
6. How to improve productivity
7. How to write a bankable business plan.
8. How to obtain money to finance the agribusiness;
9. How to invest this money to pay for business’s start-up costs;
10. How to operate the agribusiness;

SCOPE OF THE PROGRAMME

Entrepreneurship has a long history and has been defined in various ways. The term entrepreneur originated in France in 17^th and 18^th century. In 19^th Century entrepreneurship was defined as the adventurous individual who stimulates economic progress by finding new and innovative ways of accomplishing a task. Entrepreneurship is associated with discovering innovative ways to establishing and sustaining a profitable venture. Entrepreneurship and agripreneurship are terms commonly used in the context of training and small business information in agriculture. Accordingly, entrepreneurship in agriculture is the creation of innovative ventures for the purpose of growth and gain under conditions of risk and uncertainty in agriculture. Similarly, entrepreneurship is the process of creating something new with value by devoting the necessary time and effort, assuming the risk, and receiving the results, a reward of monetary and personnel satisfaction and independence.