By Gabriel Ewepu
THE Federal Government, Friday, disclosed plans to transform the nation’s 417 grazing reserves into mini-towns with stable power supply, schools, healthcare facilities, markets, abattoirs, road networks, water, sanitation, communication facilities, security, irrigation facilities, veterinary services, feed production, and others.
This was revealed by the Minister of Livestock Development, Idi Maiha, at a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, signing with the Rural Electrification Agency, REA, to provide solar-powered grids to the reserves upon their rehabilitation and resettlement. Maiha lamented that the grazing reserves have been abandoned for many years with no meaningful efforts to rehabilitate them as movements of herds of cattle, sheep, goats, pigs and others were no more sustainable.
And as a way to deescalate herder-farmer conflicts, the modernization through rehabilitation of the 417 grazing reserves became imperative, and the political will to kick start it had commenced. The signing of the MoU with REA will therefore go a long way to change the narrative as more pastoralists will be resettled in the grazing reserves, and their migrations will drastically reduce as more resources will be provided for them in the grazing reserves.
He said: “Since coming on board, this ministry has had an extensive tour of the 417 grazing reserves in the country. We have had stakeholder engagement with pastoral communities, traditional rulers, the business community, and I’ve come to the full realization that pastoralism which is being practiced today, or nomadism is no longer sustainable into the future because of a number of reasons such as climate change and acute competition for scarce resources, and there’s so much demand and expectation for our livestock sector.
“We feel that the grazing reserves we have had in this country since before independence have been abandoned, and they have suffered various degrees of abandonment. We have come up with a model, which we call Renewed Hope Livestock Village, where most of these grazing reserves are going to be rehabilitated with a number of social amenities.
“One, we will build earth dams, many of them have earth dams that will need to be desilted for the cultivation of pasture throughout the year. We will put primary schools there for the children of the herders, we will build primary health care for the families of the herders, veterinary clinics, as well as other facilities, to improve the quality of life of the pastoralists and incentivize them to remain there and have access to other economic activities.
“And the best way to do it is not to rely on a national grid. We have discovered there is a very competent federal government agency called the Rural Edification Agency. We had several discussions, and that led into writing up an MoU between them and us, and we have seen the culmination of that relationship, where the MoU has been signed.
“They will soon start rolling out the solar grids into some of these grazing reserves. We have already identified one, Wawazangi, in Gombe State. We have identified Wasem in Plateau State. We have identified Gongoshin in Adamawa State, and we have identified Ka’u in Bwari Area Council under the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, they are ready to roll out and improve the quality of life.”
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