Food Security: FAO in partnership with FG on more access to data

By Charles Kumolu

To ensure that Nigerians have more access to data on agriculture, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, FAO, in Nigeria has handed over the Computer Assisted Personal Interview, CAPI, system developed with the support of the Agricultural Market and Information System, AMIS, to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

AMIS is an inter-agency platform housed in FAO.

The project was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

AMIS was initiated in 2011 by the Ministers of Agriculture of the G20 countries to improve food market transparency, coordination and monitor price volatility.

As part of the deliverables of AMIS, CAPI System was developed in Nigeria for the collection of agricultural data.

The CAPI system would be domiciled in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development for supervision and monitoring, following the handover ceremony.

The Permanent Secretary of the ministry, Dr. Bukar Hassan, who represented the minister at the event, said: “The only way agricultural production can be sustained is when the farmers can be able to reach out to various markets to sell their products  and make some returns to enable them to invest.

Therefore, today’s programme gave us a unique opportunity to move away from traditional marketing system, monitor and evaluation system to a more digital and sustainable method where we will be able to ensure that whatever we have produced, figures we are going to have in terms of production is accurate, and therefore food security will be ensured.”

Also speaking at the occasion, the National Project Coordinator, Mr. Olutayo Oyawale, said the CAPI system will provide an unprecedented access to agriculture information from various stakeholders.

“This AMIS platform is one of the measures put in place by the FAO and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation as way to prevent food crisis in Nigeria and assist the country to achieve food security”.

With this CAPI system, inventors, agriculture  merchants, traders and farmers can make better decisions and optimize their activities in their respective roles”, Oyawale said.

The post Food Security: FAO in partnership with FG on more access to data appeared first on Vanguard News.