World Bank’s project to boost agric potentials in rural Kano

The Rural Access in Agriculture Marketing Project (RAAMP), says it has initiated viable projgrammes to improve social and economic wellbeing of rural dwellers in Kano State.

RAAMP is an infrastructure-based project funded by the World Bank, Development Finance Agency and stakeholders in the construction and environment sectors.

It seeks to fasttrack construction of access roads, hospitals, markets and other social amenities to improve livelihoods of rural folks.

The Project Coordinator in the state, Mr Sunusi Suleiman, stated this at a stakeholders’ training exercise on Tuesday in Kano.

According to Suleiman, the project is multi-dimensional designed to positively change the lives of the people through execution of viable programmes that involve contractors, design consultants and project monitoring officers.

He said the training exercise was to acquaint the participants on how to safeguard the environment for the betterment of all.

“It is an infrastructure-base project financing with the assistance of the World Bank and Finance Development Agency with the aim of creating accessibility in rural areas.

“We are billed to construct rural access roads, and improve agriculture marketing by developing some markets into agro-logistics hubs.

“Consultants and contractors are expected to go into our rural landscape and construct rural access roads, where we hope to construct 500 kilometres rural roads.

“So far, we have constructed 100 kilometres and we are going to advertise for 100 or 200 kilometres,” he said.

Suleiman said that lack of access roads made it difficult for farmers in rural areas to access health facilities, move their produce to the markets and expose them to losses.

The road projects, he said, would encouraged development of market, hospital and school infrastructure in rural communities in the state.

Also, Ali Mala, the Environmental Safeguard Officer, RAAMP, called for strict compliance with the World  Bank’s Environmental Social Framework and Standards, to facilitate successful implementation of the project.

“The project basically is to allow for rural access to communities, farmlands, to able to bring out crops to the markets, and aims at building three agro-logistics centres in the state,” he said.