The President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina, has expressed the willingness of the Bank to support the Centre for Dryland Agriculture (CDA) in addressing food security challenges in the drylands of Africa.
Dr. Adesina made this commitment when he visited the CDA to felicitate with the Centre’s MSc and PhD graduates during Bayero University’s 38th convocation ceremony.
Dr Adesina said he was impressed with the track record of the CDA, especially in winning multiple grants from the World Bank, MacArthur Foundation and other donors to address climate adaptation and food security issues in the drylands. He was also particularly impressed with the diversity of students from all over Africa.
“I was very impressed with what the University does in all areas and in particular the rigour they approach their work. I am delighted to be here at this centre, they are doing fantastic work.”
“Why this Centre is very important is that we live in an era of climate change and we get only three percent of agriculture under irrigation, therefore we have to help our farmers to make informed decisions under the uncertainties of climate. Farmers need to have access to technologies that allow their production systems to be resilient in the face of climate change.”
“I am impressed with the work that I saw here. The African Development Bank will support the work they are doing in three to four ways. First, we will work with them to become one of the key centres to get technology such as water-efficient maize, and heat-tolerance wheat varieties to farmers at the scale of millions.
“Secondly we will work with them to also become a centre which we can use in modelling work so that we can know how to predict weather patterns and get that information to farmers so that they can plant better and the Bank will work with them through a program we call Africa Disaster Insurance Facility which supports farmers in countries in the face of climate change.
“The third area that we think is going to be important is the Agric pitch for people to develop their business ideas and get up to 120,000 dollars in grants. The major thing is to adapt to climate change. We will support CDA to be able to do more and also to be able to have a significant amount of more resources to be able to do more for those that win.
“I will make sure that this centre is given priority by the Global Centre on Adaptation which I sit on the board together with the former UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon because you are doing exactly what we want to see – supporting farmers in the face of climate change,” he said.
The Director of the Centre, Professor Jibrin Mohammed Jibrin had earlier made a brief presentation about the historical evolution of the Centre, which he said was established in 2012 by the University through a MacArthur Foundation seed grant of $800,000.
… FG to Use CDA’s Facilities to Train Young Nigerian Entrepreneurs – Minister of Education
The Federal Government has disclosed that it will use the state-of-the-art facilities of the Centre for Dryland Agriculture (CDA) to train young entrepreneurs from all parts of the country as part of its initiatives to provide job opportunities and address the increasing rates of unemployment.
The Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman made this assertion when he visited the CDA’s Research and Training Farm, laboratories, and innovation hub. He said the CDA had all it takes to train entrepreneurs at all levels.
The Minister while appreciating the facilities at CDA, said the Federal Government’s new policy would be to train young people in basic skills in order to become self-reliant, especially in agriculture, which can absorb millions of them.
“The Federal Government will partner with the CDA to provide skills acquisition to the teeming youth, including those that dropped out from schools,” he said.
The Director of CDA, Professor Jibrin Mohammed Jibrin, who took the Minister around the facilities of the Centre along with the Vice Chancellor and other members of the Bayero University management team, informed the Minister that the CDA is a regional centre of excellence funded by the World Bank.
He said recently, the Centre is giving greater emphasis to entrepreneurship and innovation. “We are making this centre to provide opportunities to young people to harness their ideas and turn them into viable products and services.”
The Director stated that the Centre started “agrihacking” competition last year to provide opportunity for young entrepreneurs to pitch their business ideas for support. In the maiden edition, 90 young entrepreneurs applied out of which 10 were selected to pitch their agribusiness ideas. He said five were selected for funding and mentoring through a competitive process. The selected 5 are on mentorship to refine their ideas.
According to him, there are some venture capitalists that have shown interest in funding their ideas into products.
The Director noted that the CDA laboratory is a reference hub for fertilizer analysis, “as all fertilizers sold in parts of northern Nigeria have to be analyzed in our laboratories, we do the analysis to see whether they conform with what the companies say and we send the result to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture.
He told the Minister that the CDA Training and Research Farm regularly hosts students from secondary schools to tertiary institutions for either internship, study tour, or attachment.
The Minister then called on Nigerian companies to collaborate with Nigerian universities in order to benefit from the innovations of the universities through research.
… Review of PG Programmes and Curricula: VC Commends CDA for Setting Pace for Teaching, Research in BUK
The Vice Chancellor, Professor Sagir Adamu Abbas, has commended the Centre for Dryland Agriculture (CDA) for setting the pace for teaching and research at Bayero University, Kano.
The Vice Chancellor was making this commendation at the opening ceremony of the workshop on Curriculum Review of Postgraduate Programmes of the CDA .
The Vice Chancellor stated that the curriculum review was organized in response to the evolving global landscape, compounded by the challenges posed by the recent global pandemic, which have significantly impacted higher education delivery.
“I initiated a committee to review the curricula and mode of delivery of the CDA programmes. This initiative is part of the University’s commitment to ensuring improved visibility, wider coverage, and seamless dissemination of knowledge as well as the sustainability of the Centre and its activities,” the Vice Chancellor said.
“With the expertise of committee members drawn from various academic units of the university, including the Deans of the School of Postgraduate Studies and the Faculty of Education, Directors of Academic Planning, Centre for Information Technology, Centre for Renewable Energy and Sustainable Transition, Laboratory Management Services, Gender Studies, and the Directorate of Research, Innovation, and Partnership, I am optimistic that this committee has charted a new pathway for the Centre’s future and by extension a road map for the wider university community to follow,” he added.
According to the Vice Chancellor, it was crucial to reflect on the Centre’s journey, particularly its achievements in fulfilling its mission and vision. He noted that significant milestones include the review and validation of the curriculum in January 2018 and the five-year unreserved international accreditation received from the French High Council for Evaluation of Research and Higher Education (HCERES) in September 2019.
“The university will leverage on the existence of our Centre for Competence in Digital Education (C-CoDE) and other critical infrastructure to support these new programmes, as we navigate to a new mode of delivery,” the VC said.
Earlier in his welcome address, the Director CDA, Professor Jibrin Mohammed Jibrin expressed confidence that with the high caliber of competent personalities involved, significant achievement would be recorded in the review of the curriculum of PG programmes of the Centre.
During the opening session, a keynote address was presented by Professor Christine Iyetunde Ofulue, Director of the Regional Training and Research Institute for Distance and Open Learning (RETRIDOL), National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), titled “Shaping a Future Ready Education System: Adaptive Digital Curriculum Design for Transformative Learning.”
At the first plenary session, presentations were made by Professor Sanusi Gaya Mohammed, the Deputy Director, Training of CDA on Overview of the Report of CDA Committee on Gaps Assessment; Experience Sharing on the Implementation of Modular Delivery in Nigerian Universities: Lessons from Africa Centre of Excellence –Centre for Oilfield Chemicals Research (ACE-CEFOR), University of Port-Harcourt by Professor Ogbonna F. Joel; and Effective Digital Curricula for Higher Education by Professor Nebath Tanglang of NOUN, Abuja.
There were syndicate sessions on the review and input into the revised curriculum for each of the CDA programmes.