By Perpetua Onuegbu
The Feminist Coalition, a women’s rights organisation, said it has launched a farming initiative to empower low income women across the country.
Miss Damilola Odufuwa, Co-founder of the feminist Coalition made this known in a statement made available to newsmen on Monday in Abuja.
According to her, this is in continuation of an earlier programme by the coalition in a bid to promote accessible and affordable food.
“In June 2022, the feminist coalition began the pilot programme of the farming initiative in collaboration with Amo Farms Sieberer Hatchery Ltd, a Nigerian poultry company that created the noiler chicken.
“The aim is to provide low-income women with resources to start a poultry business which will then provide food and income for their families.
“And the majority of the women are single mothers and widows,” she said.
Odufuwa also said that at the beginning of the pilot scheme, each beneficiary was given 20 chicks, some for rearing for sell and others for consumption.
“While using part of the revenue to buy more noiler chicks.
She said that six months into the initiative, the beneficiaries were already making profits from the sales of the chickens and following this success, the coalition would be adding more women to the programme.
Miss Laila Johnson-Salami, founding member of the coalition said the noiler chicken was a dual-purpose chicken breed that produces more eggs and much meat than the native breeds.
“Amo Farms developed this breed to address issues of infant and maternal mortality, food insecurity and hunger, especially among women and children.
“With poverty and food insecurity on the rise in Nigeria, rearing noilers can provide families with more stability”.
Johnson-Salami quoted World Bank as saying that 95.1 million Nigerians live in extreme poverty — surviving on less than 1.90 dollars and N1, 200 daily, while another 25 per cent are vulnerable.
“The IMF also says that women constitute over 60 per cent of the poorest people in Nigeria, translating to over 57 million women living in extreme poverty.
“Women also make up 57 per cent of the 33 per cent of Nigerians that are unemployed, according to Nigeria’s Bureau of Statistics.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the first project of the coalition, Girls Education Programme launched in September 2021, is still ongoing with the annual full scholarship and mentorship.
The programme is targeted at brilliant young girls from low-income backgrounds in Nigeria, whose largest barrier to a quality education is financial.
NAN also reports that the scholarship not only includes full tuition payments, but also covers the boarding house fees, co-curricular activities, examination fees and other necessary school requirements and logistics.(NAN)
