Bank of Agriculture expands financial support for women farmers in Nigeria.

The Bank of Agriculture (BOA) of Nigeria has officially announced the launch of a program to eliminate the obstacles faced by women in the agricultural sector. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, women make up up to 70 percent of the country's agricultural workforce. However, as noted by the bank, citing World Bank data, only three percent of female farmers are formally involved in financial systems, while this figure reaches 10 percent among men.

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the BOA, Ayodeji Sotinrin, emphasized that the bank's work should not be limited only to issuing loans. According to him, to increase productivity, farmers need access to production inputs, mechanization, and sales markets. The bank aims to create an ecosystem that connects capital with the real needs of production. In practice, this is already being implemented through interaction with a group of female farmers in the Bwari Area Council, where financial assistance is accompanied by the provision of agricultural resources.

As part of the updated approach, the Renewed Hope Smallholder Support & Value Chain Fund is in operation. This model involves cooperation with aggregator companies to include more than two million smallholder farmers in the state lending structure. In addition to financing, farmers receive agronomic support and guarantees for the sale of produce. To implement this strategy, the bank is utilizing a concessional lending mechanism using a 250 billion naira fund, and also plans to strengthen lending capabilities through a recapitalization of 1.5 trillion naira.

Additionally, the BOA is developing a Guaranteed Minimum Price Aggregation Programme, which provides farmers with access to accredited warehouses and guaranteed sales of produce. The bank states that the goal of these initiatives is to form sustainable paths from financing to the market realization of the harvest.