Ogbonne Kalu, 65, hails from Amaokwe Item, in Bende local government area of Abia State. She lost her husband 20 years ago, and since then, she had depended on proceeds from her cassava farm to feed as well as train her five children- two of them who are now university graduates.
This is not an isolated case. Indeed, cassava cultivation and production from the mainstay of the economy of Item people, as well as several other communities in the 17 local government areas of the state, is an enterprise considered as an exclusive preserve of women, many of them elderly.
Cassava is a root crop of the botanical family and the major root crop grown in Nigeria. Some other principal root crops grown in the country are sweet potato, turmeric, Irish potatoes and others.
Cassava, which has been neglected by research workers, is now receiving attention at both national and international research centres. The significance of the crop in tropical agriculture has been recognised in the area of its growth potentials, human and animal food, its enrichment and fortification, toxicity, industrial uses, economics of production and genetic improvement.
The leaves, researchers say, constitute a good vegetable rich in protein, vitamins and minerals. The biochemistry of the crop has proved that the protein in the leaves is equal to the protein in egg. The leaves and roots, according to researchers, if properly processed, can provide balanced diet protecting millions of African children against malnutrition.
The root crop serves as food; provides employment and raw materials. Cassava can be eaten as fufu, garri, tapioca. It can also be eaten raw; roasted or fried, boiled, and in many other forms.
Furthermore, cassava serves as raw materials for bakery industries, starch for textile industries, and adhesive glucose for pharmaceutical industries, ethanol for brewery and bottling industries, as well as feed for livestock. About 22.0 million metric tonnes of cassava, produced annually in Nigeria, was used to feed livestock.
The economic importance of cassava, as well as its consumption by both human beings and animals, apparently propelled the Governor Theodore Orji-led administration in Abia state, to offer necessary incentives such as fertilizer and improved varieties as well as technical know-how to cassava farmers in the state.
LEADERSHIP gathered that the state government has a programme to allocate tractors to small-scale cassava farmers, and it seems to be doing well in this respect.
The government is also looking beyond subsistence cassava farming and production, against the backdrop of the importance of the root crop to human growth and economic development.
According to one senior official of the Abia State government, the administration is providing an enabling environment to attract large scale cassava farmers to the state, as well as industrialists, who would use raw materials from cassava to promote bakery, textile and pharmaceutical industries. “And if we are able to do this”, said the official, “the government would have succeeded in providing jobs for some of our unemployed youths, as well as increasing the internally generated revenue of the state”.
Courtesy: The Leadership
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