By Kayode Tokede
All is now set for the 2nd edition of the Ecobank Agribusiness and Food Security Summit organized in association with Vanguard Economic Forum Series.
The primary content objective of summit is to discuss the role of technology and digitisation across the agricultural value chain.
The virtual summit with the theme: Digitizing the agricultural value chain for unlocking productivity, economic growth and food security, is scheduled for June 3rd 2021 by 11am prompt and will be broadcast and streamed live via zoom and across vanguard newspapers and Ecobank social media channel platforms.
Strategic Partners to Ecobank on the summit are Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) and the Nigerian Association of Small & Medium Enterprises (NASME).
Others include the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) and Nigeria Agribusiness Group (NABG).
The speakers and panelists are carefully drawn from government, development finance institutions, banking, trade associations, civil society, non governmental organisations and subject matter experts in technology and agriculture.
Confirmed speakers include Kenton Dashiell, Deputy Director General, Partnership for Delivery, IITA; Aliyu Abdulhameed, MD/CEO, NIRSAL; Dr. Emmanuel Ijewere, Vice President, NABG; Ndidi Nwuneli, Co-founder/Managing Partner, Sahel Partner; Akin Alabi, Co-founder, Corporate Farmers International; Ayodeji Balogun, Country CEO, AFEX Commodities Exchange and Patrick Akinwuntan, Managing Director, Ecobank Nigeria, among others.
Announcing the conference in Lagos, Head of Agribusiness at Ecobank Nigeria, Mrs Mojisola Oguntoyinbo said the Summit is part of the bank’s determination to further showcase the potentials in the agricultural sector of the nation’s economy in partnership with Vanguard newspapers, the Economic Forum Series and Nigeria Agribusiness Group (NABG). According to her, the summit is also part of the bank’s continuous contribution to the growth and development of the agriculture sector, stating that a pool of notable thought leaders and industry experts have been assembled to address how technology can aid the entire agriculture value chain to bring about economic development and food sufficiency in the country.
She explained “This virtual conference is part of Ecobank Digital Series which is in line with our vision to consolidate a modern pan-African market, contribute to the economic development and financial integration of the continent.
“The summit would amongst other things examine the potential impact of agriculture technology investment in fixing low productivity in Nigeria’s food production; evaluate existing traditional agriculture finance models in Nigeria and the role and impact of technology enabled commodity exchange trading across the agriculture value chain, and the role of developmental partners and international agencies in driving funding and investments across the agriculture value chain.”
She noted that the Agribusiness Summit would help Ecobank communicate and connect with Nigeria’s entrepreneurs in the agric value chain, farmers and other investors, adding that the bank will also showcase its strength in the digital banking space such as its innovative digital payment channels like the OmniPlus, Omnilite and digital sales collections channels like Ecobankpay NQR amongst other financial service offerings to close the large financial Inclusion gap and a direct response to mitigating the economic challenge post-COVID-19.
Also speaking, Jude Ndu, Director, Vanguard Conferences and The Economic Forum Series said: “we are indeed pleased and delighted with the ongoing high-level strategic partnership with Ecobank Nigeria in the area of concept development, synthesis, design and execution of high profile thematic bespoke events. The upcoming conference speaks to the strong sense of confidence the bank has in us to help curate thought leadership content and context for the brand in line with its marketing objectives. “As a media organisation, this is our own way of contributing to the growth prospect of the sector through audience engagement by bringing together critical stakeholders to discuss solutions to the issues of low productivity and food insecurity in the country.
The Ecobank Digital Series is a virtual programme organised by Ecobank to educate and enlighten the public on crucial issues of public interest, especially as it relates to their financial empowerment.