No fewer than 60 corps members were on Friday trained on modern farming methods at the College of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Technology (CAFFTECH), Ijeda-Ojesa, Osun.
Participants were trained on modern farming techniques under the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneur Development (SAED) programme.
Speaking during the training, the Proprietor of CAFFTECH, Dr. Gabriel Ogunsanya, said it was part of efforts to create employment through agriculture.
Ogunsanya, who noted that there was no white-collar jobs for graduates in the country, encouraged the corps members to take to farming.
He advised them to join cooperatives societies and commodity bodies where they would have access to soft loans and markets after the training.
“Let’s come together to build this nation; work and get money; serious and become a man,” he charged the participants.
The NYSC State Coordinator, Mrs. Olayinka Abdulwahab, said that purpose of the training was basically to equip and empower them to be financially independent and productive.
Abdulwahab, represented by the Assistant Director, Corps Inspection and Monitoring, NYSC, Osun, Mrs. Omoboade Adesina, commended the management of the institution for collaborating with the scheme to train the corps members.
She charged the corps members to use their Community Development Service (CDM) to contribute to the development of their host community.
Abdulwahab equally appealed to corps members to utilise the training to become employers of labour after their service year.
Earlier, the Oniwoye of Iwoye-ijesa, Oba Adewumi Ogidiolu, said that the initiative would set the corps members on the right paths if they develop interest in farming.
Oba Ogidiolu observed that despite the scarcity of fuel and new naira notes across the country, people were still coping.
“But no one can live without food,” the traditional ruler said.
He urged the participants to prioritise agriculture to earn a better living condition, saying that agricultural sector remained the most viable way to succeed as a nation.
“Especially at a time when a country’s foreign exchange is dwindling, our dependency on oil sector has brought the country on its knees,” he said.
The Coordinator of CAFFTECH, Mrs. Christians Ogunsanya, called on the corps members to develop interest in agriculture as it is the best way out of the present unemployment bedeviling the country.
The coordinator emphasised that the school was training both young and middle aged in modern agricultural practices to become successful farmers.
She said that the institute train people in crop farming, animal husbandry, fishery, mushroom production and seed multiplication.
In his remarks, one of the corps members, Damilola Emmanuel, lauded the management of scheme for the gesture.