CBN Anchor Programme: Association establishes offices in 24 LGAs in Kano state

The Wheat Farmers Association of Nigeria (WFAN), Kano State Chapter, has established offices in 24 Council Areas of the state to facilitate registration of farmers for the CBN anchor borrower programme.
The Chairman of the association in the state, Alhaji Faruk Rabiu disclosed this in an interview with Newsmen in Kano on Friday.

He said the association found it necessary to open the offices in the local government areas following the poor response of farmers toward the programme.
According to him, establishing the offices will reduce the hardship being encountered by many farmers who have to travel to the state capital from remote areas for the registration.
“Due to the current economic recession, many farmers have complained of lack of money to transport themselves, hence the decision to establish the offices,” he said.

He said that the number of farmers, who have so far registered, was far below the target number expected to register for the programme.
“Our target is 75, 000 farmers but unfortunately since the registration commenced on Monday, Aug.15, only 7, 500 farmers have so far registered,” he said.

He called on farmers, particularly local ones, to come and register for the programme in view of the importance the Federal Government attached to the programme.
“Most of the farmers are yet to understand the programme because they are not used to taking agric loans.

“Secondly, the conditions farmers must meet before getting the loan is also another challenge as majority of the local farmers have no business with bank let alone open an account,” he said.
He said that the association had distributed 200 application forms to each of the 44 local government areas of the state as part of effort to encourage farmers to take part in the programme.