Irrigation farming has helped to create 75,000 jobs and supported the efforts to achieve national food security, the Minister of Water Resources, Mrs. Sarah Ochekpe, has said.

    She disclosed in Abuja during her mid-term sport on the progress and achievement of the ministry during this year’s Ministerial briefing.

    She stressed that irrigation was critical to national food production noting that it has engaged mostly farming communities to alleviate poverty from among them.

    She listed food commodities that witnessed boost in production through irrigation to include rice, maize, wheat, sorghum and assorted vegetables.

    She said: “It is obvious that Nigeria cannot continue to depend on rain fed agriculture alone, considering the rate of its population growth, urbanisation and climate change.”

     Irrigation is therefore, critical to the nation’s food production, agro-industrial raw material, employment generation and poverty alleviation.

    During the period under review, the Ministry recorded some achievements in its efforts towards supporting the attainment of national food security with the new developed irrigation and drainage projects.

    “The ministry recorded the production of 75,802 tonnes of rice, 51,631 tonnes of maize, 2,800 tonnes of wheat, 50,695 tonnes of sorghum and 177,050 tonnes of assorted vegetables.”

    Ochekpe said substantial achievements were also recorded in the development of irrigation infrastructure, land reclamation and drainage construction nationwide.

    Then she said, included over 31,000 hectares of irrigated land and the commencement of an eight-pilot land drainage reclamation projects of about 420 hectares in the Niger Delta areas.