The Nigeria Institute of Soil Science (NISS) has trained 41 farmers and extension agents from Northwestern states on the use of the upgraded NISSAGRO version 2.0 Mobile Application.
The training had participants drowned from Kano, Kaduna, Katsina, Jigawa, Sokoto, Kebbi, and Zamfara and was held at Kano State Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (KNARDA) office on Tuesday.
The aim of the training which was coordinated by Sharhabil Musa Yahaya (RSS) on behalf of the Zonal Coordinator of NISS is to digitalize the farming system nationwide.
He said: “The main focus is to the training of participants on every part of the application to promote their farming activities as well as train their colleagues at home so as to be parts of the beneficiaries of the use of the application.
“A total of 41 persons were in attendance including farmers (2 from each state), extension agents (2 from each state), NISS staff (8 in number), KNARDA officials (4 in number).”
In his address, the Managing Director of KNARDA Dr. Junaidu Yakubu represented by the Director Extension of the Agency Alhaji Gambo Isa commended NISS for organizing the train the trainers’ workshop on the use of the Upgraded application 2.0.
He tasked the participants to concentrate and learn the APP fully so that they will be good ambassadors in disseminating the information and training others on the APP.
Alhaji Yakubu also commended the effort of NISS in upgrading version 1.0 to 2.0 in a short period of time, showing that the application is receiving much attention.
He also tasked NISS to monitor the step-down training in the various states by the trained extension agents and the farmers.
The KNARDA Boss then commended the organizers for such a gesture and call for other Institutions in the country to emulate NISS so that farmers can benefit from their programs.
NISSAGRO expert, Aisha Buba gave background information on the upgraded version of the APP and pointed out all the different components added together with the special features added.
She enjoyed trainees to make input for better usage of the application.
Speaking with newsmen, she said: “Many questions were asked and some suggestions were pointed out on how to further improve the APP. Some of the suggestions include the development of offline use of the app in areas where there are no internet services and GPS coordinates should be added in farm record taking.”
She assured that more crops and publications in form of cartoons and local dialects should also be added to the APP.
Participants at the training workshop expressed their satisfaction with the improvements made to the Mobile APP.
They promised to step down the training to other members of their farmers’ groups.
(pyramidfm)
