How To Start An Agricultural Training Workshop In Nigeria
This article will deal with how to start an agricultural training workshop in Nigeria and its importance in details.
Agriculture deals with the cultivation of crops and rearing of animals for diverse purposes.
Agricultural training workshops is the practical art of studying soil, crop, animals, maintenance and repair of farm equipment or tools, identification of weed control, pest and control, harvesting and preservation of crops and practically every other aspect of agriculture.
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Live, Study and Work in Canada. No Payment is Required! Hurry Now click here to Apply >> Immigrate to CanadaThe aim is to educate potential agriculturists for the purposes of employment and investment in the sector.
The continuous dependence of the Nigerian economy on crude oil has greatly crippled the agricultural sector which holds more prospects and has great potentials of an economic boom if properly utilized.
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The simple fact that many Nigerians are unable to feed in such a fertile land is a pointer to the need to do more in the agricultural sector.
Most of the food we consume in Nigeria is exported because our local farmers are unable to meet up the large consumption demand.
This is typically caused by a lack of know-how on the part of the farmers and a general lack of interest in farming. The average Nigerian youth considers farming as a sport for the rural people and a dirty job; this is in its entirety a very false perception that needs to be corrected.
Nigerians in recent times have been propelled by the lack of job opportunities to embrace farming, hence you find that fisheries, poultry, rice farms are increasing in numbers and this should be encouraged.
One of the most effective ways of encouraging farming and agricultural investments is by training young people on how to successfully venture into farming.
How Lucrative is the business of running an agricultural training workshop?
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Live, Study and Work in Canada. No Payment is Required! Hurry Now click here to Apply >> Immigrate to CanadaTraining workshops generally cost a lot to run; it is not an anomaly that the costs of trainings are quite high. People get to pay as much as a hundred thousand and above to get trained.
Your profitability and break even here will depend on how many trainees you able to get within a training period and how often you get them.
There are actually very few agricultural training institutes and a workshop especially in urban areas, starting one is a welcome development.
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If for instance the cost of training is 100,000 and you able to train eighty people into two batches in a year, you will get about 8,000000 which fair considering that you can actually have more students.
Examples of agricultural training institutes in Nigeria are Jethel enterprise, surulere Lagos, Leventis foundation agric training schools Abuja and Marvico farms Owerri, Imo state.
Importance of Agricultural Training Workshops
Agricultural training boost agriculture as trainees implement their knowledge by venturing into crop and animal production and this creates employment while ensuring a food surplus.
Almost every commercial farmer has a good number of trained agriculturists on his farm to assist in daily administration for maximum output.
Apart from crude oil, agriculture is the largest revenue generator in Nigeria. The export of cash crops like cocoa, rubber, kolanuts, garri, and groundnut has yielded a lot of foreign exchange.
A proper investment in agriculture will see a drastic reduce in the rural urban migration as a lot of people in rural areas will be gainfully employed.
Food shortage is mostly caused by lack of basic agricultural infrastructure, lack of farming incentives and a lack of technological know-how.
Majority of these can be fixed with intensive agricultural training and investments in form of machinery, gift of seedlings, manure and fertilizer, farm tools etc
Agriculture provides agro based materials to the manufacturing and production industries example wool and hide. This reduces cost of finished goods and reduces the exorbitant cost of exporting raw materials for production.
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Agricultural workshops render training in:
Production training
Which covers transplanting, irrigation, record keeping, seedling, green house, soils, crop rotation, weed management, pest management, soil and water testing, harvest and post harvest etc
Crop Planning
Understanding crop seasons, seeds and supplies etc
Equipment Training
Basic operation and safety measures, equipment maintenance, tractor based cultivation, weeding and seeding.
Farm Labour Experience
Providing opportunities for trainees to gain experience on farms to gain critical labour skills that prepare them to successfully run their own farms.
Marketing strategies and Insurance
How to Start Agricultural Training Workshops
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Training and Experience Needed
You start by ensuring that you possess the right qualifications as you cannot give what you do not have. Except you already have professional certifications and practical experience in agriculture, you cannot impart others.
Your qualification and experience is a validation of your skill and professionalism. Your qualification might be a university degree or a professional license garnished with years of experience. Experience is what gives your qualifications leverage and sets you apart as a leader.
Equipment Needed:
Because training are practical, you will need equipment that trainees can see, feel and use. These include farm tools and basic equipment like
Location
I think an agricultural training institute will fly anywhere but in commercialized cities like Lagos with no available lands for commercial farming, it will be difficult to fly but I maybe wrong. Abuja, Kogi, Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Edo, Osun are example of places were workshops will be better located.
Your facility should also be large enough for classrooms and perhaps laboratories, ample spaces for practical, and storage of equipment.
Funding Needed
You will need to register with the ministry of agriculture or the agricultural development project to be valid.
These can help you with start up incentives. You also need farm tools, farm equipment, and seedlings to practice with. You need about two million naira to set up adequately.
Marketing Strategy
Its okay to print and distribute flyers, hold small educative rallies especially in rural areas as not some of them are in tandem with modern advertising mediums. Make use of all media available to you (traditional and digital).
Management Strategy
You need to hire professional hands to assist in training; you can liaison with other farms around you for practical sessions.
As this is the most reliable and fastest way to learn. The need to hire only qualified hands cannot be over emphasized for sustainability.
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Conclusion
To start a training workshop, you must also have a passion to help others by instilling knowledge, advise and professional help in them, your passion is the fuel that keeps you going.
Agriculture fosters both urban and rural entrepreneurship, setting up an agricultural training workshop is a laudable initiative with long term benefits.