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National Office for Technology Acquisition and Promotion (NOTAP) in collaboration with Friesland Campina (FC), WAMCO has trained over 30 prospective dairy entrepreneurs in Gombe for the North-East zone on modern methods of dairy production, in a move geared towards popularizing dairy entrepreneurship in Nigeria.
Speaking at a one-day program in Gombe to educate dairy entrepreneurs Recently, Dr. DanAzumi Mohammed Ibrahim, Director General of NOTAP, stated that the program was created out of a desire to promote local content in dairy products in Nigeria.
According to the press release signed by Raymond Onyenezi Ogbu, Nigeria has a monolithic economy and needs to diversify, particularly through the agro-based sector, if it hopes to be among the developed countries in the world.
He continued by saying that although there are many cows in Nigeria, they only produce a little amount of milk due to poor and insufficient knowledge of contemporary procedures for managing and breeding cows, which is why modern cow breeding training is necessary.
The DG informed the gathering that Vietnam and the Netherlands which are the highest producers of milk don’t have the number of cows Nigeria has but they embraced the global best practices in dairy development to ensure high milk yield.
He stated that technology is what rules the world and for Nigerian dairy entrepreneurs to upscale their business to the point of producing enough milk for the Nigerian market, they must adopt modern methods of breeding and milking cows.
He noted that Cows that produce enough milk are usually ranched in a center where they are well-fed with adequate hygiene assured.
He advised the entrepreneurs to form cooperative societies and groups as history has shown that the level of success of individual cow breeders was far less than when they form groups.
He said that the company had built a very successful global dairy program and that Nigeria has the potential to do well in dairy development if well managed.
He revealed that the partnership ensured that in every cup of milk you take in Nigeria today, there is two percent local content with the intention of a gradual increase.