By Victor Nwegede
The new Project Manager of the Middle Rima Valley Irrigation Scheme, MRVIS Goronyo of Sokoto Rima River Basin Development Authority, Engr. Shau'ibu Y. Isah has charged all the farmers under his scheme to utilize every opportunity and programme introduced by TRIMING Project to attain best farming practice for higher productivity in the country.
Engr. Isah gave the charge on Wednesday while addressing the farmers and members of Water Users Association, WUA Goronyo, selected to be the respondents of the TRIMING Project's mid-evaluation survey of the irrigation system in the area.
He said that the survey was meant to ascertain from all the stakeholders that practice irrigation farming within the scheme and those who are most aware of TRIMING Project interventions.
The Project Manager advised the farmers to always avail themselves to every programme on how to improve in their occupations.
He said that TRIMING Project came to add value to what the farmers are already doing and however, asked them to play their own responsibilities well to make improvement.
He explained: "There is concept of participatory irrigation management which TRIMIG Project is enhancing. For example, government has its roles in the irrigation management, WUA leadership has the roles to play from the units to apex levels. Our relationship between the government and the common man must be very friendly. A farmer who is the common man has a certain role to play to keep this project moving forward. If every stakeholder of this project plays his or her roles very well, we can do marvelously well. TRIMING Project has been adding value to the participatory irrigation system by exposing farmers, all the stakeholders and staff of this scheme through seminars, workshops, sensitizations, and meetings from village to village and from sector to sector, among others."
It could be recalled that five schemes including Bakalori Irrigation Scheme, BIS, Dadinkowa Irrigation Scheme, DKIS, Hadejia Valley Irrigation Scheme, HVIS, Kano Valley Irrigation Scheme, KRIS, and Middle Rima Valley Irrigation Scheme, MRVIS were selected for the quantitative survey.
One of the TRIMING Project team, Mr. Moses Onazi explained that the selected respondents for the survey was as a part of the evaluation of the Behaviour Communication Change, BCC, strategy implemented by Transforming Irrigation Management in Nigeria (TRIMING) Project.
Onazi also stated that the project seeks to improve access to irrigation and drainage services, and strengthen institutional arrangements for integrated water resources management and agricultural services delivery in selected large-scale public schemes in some parts of Nigeria.
He added: "the purpose of the BCC evaluation is to assess the communication strategy adopted for the project and to learn what worked or did not work, and why."
The team also said that the survey is a major component of the evaluation and called for the cooperation of the selected respondents from the scheme on feeding them with their respective opinions on the processes, implementation and outcomes of the BCC activities of the project in MRVIS Goronyo.
Meanwhile, the programme recorded a successful outing as it well featured all the key stakeholders needed for the exercise in the scheme.
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