The national project coordinator of the Agro-Climatic Resilience in Semi-Arid Landscapes (ACReSAL), Abdulhamid Umar, has said 70, 000 people captured as beneficiaries in Niger state must produce their national identity card for verification and authentication.
Umar stated this in Minna on Friday while leading the team of Implementation Mission to authenticate beneficiaries in Bosso and Paiko local governments of the state.
“Bosso community, we are told that we have more than 20, 000 beneficiaries based on the investment that we have done there. We have also been able to cover over 140 hectares of land in the area,” he said.
He said another group of 50, 000 people had been earmarked as beneficiaries in the Mokwa area of the state.
“The implementers and officers of ACReSAL in Niger state also told us that the investment in the large plantation by the roadside and other areas has large numbers of beneficiaries of about 50,000 at the last count.”
Umar, however, appealed to the media to assist ACReSAL in the authentication and verification of beneficiaries, adding that “this will be of immense benefit to the local communities to know and demand what actually belongs to them.”
“The Federal Ministry of Environment has mandated us to liaise with the National Identity Management Commission for the beneficiaries to be identified with their National Identification Number (NIN).”
He said the World Bank provided the sum of $700 million for the project, adding that “Niger state is set to be on the same page with Katsina and Gombe states that have been able to draw 20m to $25 million from the project.”
