Mr. Alieu Jawo of Ferebee Trading Enterprise, previously served as an Agricultural Extension Officer under Department of Agriculture (DoA), in the various agricultural communities across the country.
In an exclusive interview with Mansa Banko Online, he issued a clarion call to Gambian youth to embrace agriculture in order to attain food self-sufficiency, better living conditions and earn extra income.
Saying his main objective as an extension officer was to change the living conditions of poor farmers, Jawo asserted, “I take it as a duty to visit farmers of all types at their farms and homes to offer them free technical advice in terms of new technologies as well as solving their problems to achieve maximum productivity.”
Currently posted to North Bank Region (NBR) as Field Assistant under the the Resilience of Organizations for Transformative Smallholder Agriculture Project (ROOTS Project), Jawo refreshed he had served as Agricultural Extension Officer in Central River Region North (CRR-N), Foni Kansala (in West Coast), and other places since 2009, before his graduation with a Diploma in General Agriculture in 2014.
“Access to quality food and good living conditions of poor rural farmers motivates me [into agriculture],” Jawo added.
The ROOTS Project Field Assistant acknowledged in this interview that, the Gambian State is doing its utmost best in helping farmers. But he suggested that Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) should be strengthened to ensure sustainability, as he charged that “what concerns all must be discussed by all”. He argued that the problems concern both farmers and government, and therefore, all the affected parties must sit to iron out issues so as to find common solutions.
In his view, as long as agriculture is the backbone of this country, every Gambian, irrespective of one’s condition or status, should engage in either small or large scale farming, stressing “that is why urban agriculture was introduced”. Jawo said people should be able to produce food that could contribute to their food security.
The BSc student in General Agriculture and Environmental Science at the University of The Gambia (UTG) said he pioneered an agricultural enterprise called Ferebee Trading Enterprise, comprising twelve (12) youth-both at home and abroad.
Jawo outlined the enterprise revolves around agriculture, construction, health, marketing and trade, disclosing also that this year, they registered the enterprise with the National Seed Secretariat in Abuko, to produce quality cowpea.
“In 2018-2019 raining season, we harvested lots of cowpea and the seeds were given to us by the secretariat. Since then, Ferebee continues to borrow pieces of land to grow both vegetables and field crops,” according to him.
The Agriculture Specialist said they are hoping to secure their own land and venture into ‘full-fledged’ crops and livestock production and productivity.
