Palm Oil: Investors Pool $531M In 9 Months

A minimum of  200,000  new jobs would be created in the coming years as Edo State Government allocates 62,200 hectres of land to investors who have already brought in over $531 million in the past nine months for palm production.

The Edo State Oil Palm Programme (ESOPP), according to the Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security, Mr. Stephen Idehenre, involves use of  Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and Free Prior Informed Consent (FPIC) Guidelines to engage communities in land allocation.

Idehenre said the 200,000 jobs would be created across the oil palm production value chain.

The state, which inaugurated its FOARE Mushroom Production Centre and flag-off of the 2022 Farming Season in Benin City on Monday said the Governor Godwin Obaseki-led government had prioritized agriculture to ensure it actualised the Making Edo Great Again (MEGA) project.

According to Idehenre, Edo State aims to bring opportunities to large, medium and small-scale investors in the oil palm sub-sector so as to de-risk investments in agriculture and agro-allied sector.

“We will add over 1,000,000 metrics tons to local production of Crude Palm Oil (CPO) by 2030,” the commissioner informed journalists in Benin-City on Monday

The newly inaugurated production centre, he said, would create 50 direct and 200 indirect jobs. “I thank the proponents of this venture for their commitment to the cause of supporting the government in wealth creation through innovative approaches such as this,’’ Idehenre said.

“I urge all, especially the farmers, to take the advantage of this event to interact with experts and major actors in the agricultural value chain to grow and increase productivity in their enterprise of interest.”

“We are distributing 21 motorbikes to prioritize agriculture extension workers at this event to further strengthen extension service delivery and knowledge management. The state is making steady progress in the agriculture sphere, which will drive home the sector as a major economic pillar for job and wealth creation,” Idehenre said.

Coordinator of the programme in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Mr. Wellington Omoragbon, said the Edo State government had sustained effective collaboration and investment in the agric sector and urged citizens to support programmes that would improve food production, processing and marketing across the value chain.