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Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State, on Tuesday, flagged off the 2026 distribution of fertilisers and other farm inputs to 63,000 registered smallholder farmers in the state.
Mbah also said the move was in line with his administration’s commitment to eradicating poverty and growing Enugu State into a $30 billion economy, noting that 40 per cent of the growth would come from agriculture.
Mbah said his administration had always seen agriculture as more than just a mere source of food, but as big business, hence the efforts to migrate Enugu farmers from subsistence to commercial farming.
“We have done this in the last three years, essentially providing fertilisers, agrochemicals, stems, seeds, and seedlings to improve our yields. Today, we have 63,000 bags of fertilisers. We have to train our farmers.
“We also have to migrate our smallholder farmers from subsistence farming to mechanised farming, which is why we also invested in machinery. And that means that we are going to start thinking about a full value chain.
“We are looking at exports, playing in all the value chains, being able to export fresh produce from here to other parts of the world, being able to process our produce, add value, package, and then export. This is also why the airport concession and cargo terminal are important to us,” he said.
Mbah called on those saddled with the distribution to ensure that the inputs got to the farmers by sticking to the database and also warned the farmers against selling the inputs.
“We are working with our database. We are also going to implore all our stakeholders, the Local Government Chairmen, and the priests in the various communities to make sure that these inputs get to the end users, free of charge. Please, make sure that these inputs get to our farmers. We do not want middlemen.
“The fertilisers also have ‘Not for Sale’ boldly written on them. So, you must make sure that you use this to scale up our production so that we can have a bumper harvest and drive down the cost of food in Enugu,” he stressed.
He said the Special Agro-Processing Zones, one of the agro-industrialisation initiatives of his administration, would soon come on board to scale up production and cut post-harvest losses.
“We want to make sure that we increase the earning capacity of our various communities where we actually have a lot of our poor people. We’re building our farm roads so that it will be easy for us to evacuate what we have produced,” he stated.
Earlier in his remarks, the Commissioner for Agriculture and Agro-Industrialisation, Dr. Patrick Ubru, announced a significant increase in the 2026 Agricultural Free Inputs Distribution Programme compared to 2024.
“In 2024, over 12,000 bags of fertiliser, improved seeds, and chemicals were distributed, rising to over 40,000 last year.
“Today, over 63,000 bags will be distributed, representing a 58 per cent increase from last year.
“Thousands of farmers across the 17 Local Government Areas will receive free improved rice, maize, tomato and pepper seeds, cassava stems, fertilisers, and agrochemicals to boost productivity and reduce costs,” he said.
Beyond the support through inputs, Ubru said the Mbah administration had established a modern Seed Testing Laboratory and Seed Gallery, digitally profiled over 84,000 farmers, and integrated agricultural data into the state’s Geographic Information System (GIS).
“Over 25,000 farmers have been trained in climate-smart agriculture, while we are also providing Seasonal Climate Prediction Information through our partnership with the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet).
“The 260 Farm Estate Programme is underway in Enugu State, and a tractor assembly plant has been established through a partnership with Nortra Tractors, making mechanisation more accessible.
“Additionally, centre pivot irrigation systems are being rehabilitated to enable year-round cultivation of crops like rice,” he added.
In his remarks, the Agricultural Transformation Agenda Support Programme Phase One (ATASP-1) Coordinator, Romanus Egba, assured the governor of well-planned distribution channels, using clergy and community leaders to ensure that the various items reached the intended beneficiaries.
In addition to a bag of fertiliser, he said, “each farmer will get one bag of maize or rice, cassava cuttings, herbicide, and vegetable seeds such as tomatoes or pepper.”
The representative of the Farmers Association of Nigeria (FAN), Enugu State Chapter, Sir Emmanuel Chukwuemeka Eneh, while thanking Governor Mbah for his consistent massive investment in agriculture, warned any farmer or anybody who colludes to sell any of the farm inputs to be ready to go to jail.
