President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, has insisted that Africa must not only feed itself with adequate food but feed itself with pride.
Adesina said: “not only must Africa feed itself, it must feed itself with pride. Africa must also unlock the potentials of agriculture, turning agriculture from something that you use for managing poverty, to something that you use for creating wealth.”
The Nigeria former minister of Agriculture spoke yesterday, Friday in Des Moines, the capital city of Iowa, United States of America, when he was honoured with the World Food Prize. The prize money is $250,000 which he said he would use to set up a foundation for African youth development in Agriculture.
The AfDB President thanked God for taking him this far in his chosen profession, saying: ” it is simply amazing that the son of ATQ poor farmer can be at the world stage receiving this award. I will dedicate my life to feeding the world.”
He expressed gratitude to former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who was present with former Ghanaian President, John Mahama, for nominating him to serve as a minister in Jonathan’s government.
“For me, the World Food Prize is a great honour and recognition for all of the work that I have done for decades of my life. But it also puts wind behind our sail as we now take off to feed Africa, because it is a job that has to be complete.
“The World Food Prize is a great motivation which puts the wind behind the sails of what the African Development Bank is doing with its development priorities – the High 5s – especially Feed Africa.
The President of the Bank noted how the High 5s were all linked, and pledged the commitment of the Bank to continue its development work in Africa.
Adesina stressed the need to put technology and information in the hands of farmers describing the mobile phone as the most important tool in the hands of a farmer.
“With it, they will find out information about the market, about weather, and about to access finance. They will be able to get information about nutrition for mothers, for instance. That is very important. That was why when I was Minister of Agriculture in Nigeria, we launched this electronic wallet system that allows farmers to access fertilizers, and we reached well over 15 million farmers.”[myad]
