As part of efforts to enhance food production in the country, the Rural Electrification Agency, REA, plans to deploy 10,000 mini-grid solutions to power rural farmers by 2030.
Rocky Mountain Institute and the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet are supporting the Energizing Agriculture Program.
It is also intended to hasten the implementation of energy-agriculture solutions to farmers, particularly in the countryside.
By building projects that would speed the productive use of power in rural communities, the scheme is projected to open up numerous prospects in the industry.
Commenting during the launch, the Managing Director of the REA, Mr. Ahmad Salihijo, said “in the past year, the agency had developed a unique relationship with the Rocky Mountain Institute to develop the concept for the scheme.”
“We ventured into the Energy-Agriculture space to create a nexus that allows us to utilize the key activity in rural communities to improve the productive use of electricity, which includes agricultural activities.”
He went on to say that the REA’s top aim is to ensure that the solutions implemented in rural regions have both social and economic consequences for the people who reside there.
Dr. Andrew Kwasari, Special Assistant to the President on Agriculture, also spoke at the ceremony, emphasizing the importance of power provision in enhancing agricultural production in rural regions.
According to him, data shows that power is important to rural economies not only because it lights up homes, but also because it solves the problem that drives rural smallholder agriculture’s contributions to climate change and deforestation by providing a source of power to either process local produce or contribute to climate change.
Nigeria, which has one of the lowest net energy generation per capita rates in the world, with a national electrification rate of 55 percent and a rural electrification rate of only 39 percent, will profit from the move.
To attain universal access to electricity by 2030, the government needs to connect between 500,000 and 800,000 families every year, with a focus on rural areas.
Increased access to electricity will spur technical innovations in the agricultural industry, particularly in areas where farmers rely heavily on traditional methods.