President Muhammadu Buhari advised West and Central African countries to engage youth for agricultural development to help meet demands of the rising population

President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria.

The engagement of the youth in agriculture will engender employment generation, food production and wealth creation, the President noted.

“Arising from this development is that the youth issues need to be addressed in both the rural and urban sectors to enable us avoid future problems,” stated Buhari.

“One of the ways to address this urgent concern is to accord priority attention to the transformation of agricultural production in the rural areas, with the youth population as agent of change and transformation,” he added.

IFAD President, Kanayo Nwanze in a recent keynote said governments of West and Central Africa should heavily invest on young farmers to limit the unprecedented rise of youth restiveness and social vices.

According to Nwanza, it is time to improve African agriculture after years of neglect.“It’s time to reverse decades of neglect of African agriculture. It must be reversed because when you abandon agriculture you abandon your nation’s ability to feed itself,” he said.