By; VICTOR DURUAMAKU, Owerri
Former Minister of Trade and Industries, Chief Charles Chukwuemeka
Ugwuh has said that Imo State, as inherited by the present administration, is a failed state destroyed by the immediate past administration.
The former minister however, proposed measures needed to tackle the
agricultural problems of the state and thereby making the state
agricultural prosperous state.
Chief Ugwuh, an accomplished administrator, technocrat and a
politician with experience spoke as a representative of Chief Leo Stan
Ekeh the chairman and chief executive officer of Zinox Computers.
He said, that he chose this topic “Rebuilding Imo State and Growing
her Economy”, for this occasion, the inauguration of Heartland
Professionals Network in Owerri.
It would be recalled that during the last guber electioneering
campaign, Emeka Ihedioha, now governor, had told the people of Imo
state that his government would cause ‘agricultural revolution’
because the former government headed by ex-governor Rochas Okorocha
did not do much agriculturally in the State.
In the 2019 fiscal, which was the last budget the administration of
ex governor Okorocha made, agricultural and manufacturing sectors were given less attention by Okorocha as only N5 billion was earmarked for
each out of the total of N276,818,071, 812.00 for 2019 fiscal year.
However, Ugwuh in his speech informed that in order to grow the
agricultural sector of Imo State economy, much attention should be
given to the development of the Imo River Valley.
“The Imo River Valley is an available strip of land stretching from Ideato through Onuimo, Ihitte Uboma and further down through Mbaise (Itu, Eziudo, Umuogu, Ogbor) in Imo state and to Owerrinta in Abia State,” he said.
According to him “currently, our capacity to locally grow our own food
and feed ourselves has declined to a worrisomed level, where virtually
all food crops consumed by Imo people are imported from other states.
“Since the short supply of available land is one of the major obstacles claimed to be limiting our capacity to grow our food, in my view, the first step towards growing the agricultural sector of our
economy, is the development of the Imo River Valley”.
He stated that from the source to destination, the Imo River Valley
occupies an estimated area of over 50,000 hectares of available/fertile land.
In order to develop the agricultural sector, Governor Ihedioha explained during his campaign days that he would liaise with the federal government for the operation of FADAMA projects in the state.
But Ugwuh who was one of the industrialists that formed part of the
committee for industry and agriculture and developed a blue print with
which the current government intends to work with, said that with the
assistance of the federal government, two damns could be constructed
on the Imo River Valley to ensure all the year round farming.
According to him, “over 20,000 hectares of land can be sourced from
the River Valley in the first instance, and leased to private sector for massive mechanized cultivation of rice, maize, soya beans and other available crops in what can become a large cluster of farms linked to the Okigwe Silo project.
