Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River State has approved the release of N247m to 100 farmers trained under the World Bank supported Commercial Agriculture Development Project.

Mr. Ducham Amah, the Project Coordinator, made the disclosure in Calabar on Wednesday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria.

“Each beneficiary gets between N2.4m and N2.5m and as I speak, all of them have received alert of this money as paid into their account.”

Amah said the money would be released to the farmers in tranches.


 
The coordinator disclosed that the government had approved N85m to train another set of 600 people in Songhai farm.

“We forwarded the list of 600 to the World Bank and to His Excellency, and two months ago he approved that list.

“He not only approved the list but also approved N85m being the budget for the training of this 600 in Songhai farm. They are to commence their training this month.

“Not only that, we have also sent a proposal to him for the empowerment of this 600 trainees and he has approved the sum of N1.5bn to be spent on their empowerment.”

Amah said that the state would receive up to $26.34 million under the commercial agriculture programme.

He dismissed reports in the social media that the state was unable to access the funds.