The Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), the apex body of all Pentecostal Churches in Nigeria, has thrown its weight behind the ‘Food4All Initiative’ to tackle hunger and hardship among Nigerians, especially vulnerable citizens.
The ‘Food4All Initiative’, is a pro-Nigeria food security and agri-food entrepreneurship intervention programme created to help solve Nigeria & food crisis, hunger, youth and women unemployment, household poverty, and national insecurity.
The initiative was jointly created by FUND-YES Cooperative (a subsidiary social enterprise operated by Youths Off The Street Initiative) and Multi-Life Savers For The Less Privileged People, headed by Kennedy Iyere and Ejike Mbaka respectively.
Bishop Francis Wale-Oke, national president of PFN, who hosted the Food4All advocacy team in his church in Ibadan, led by Kennedy Iyere, described it as worthwhile and pledged PFN’s full support for the programme.
This programme, the Food4All Initiative, is a great intervention that is God-sent to take care of the ticking time bomb of food insecurity and acute hunger crisis, which if not speedily and squarely tackled will explode Nigeria into a chaotic and catastrophic mass protest by angry hungry people, who are overwhelmed with unbearable hunger and economic hardship,” he said.
Iyere, head, of FUND-YES Cooperatives, speaking also, said that the initiative was designed to grow a national grassroots cooperative business network of six million food entrepreneurs. He disclosed further that a fundraising campaign for the initiative will kick-start on Thursday, July 11, 2024.
According to him, the initiative was designed to raise and generate funds globally for the implementation of the ‘One-Family-One-Farmer Scheme’ and the financing of youth and young women as Smart Farmers.
Iyere called on Nigerians both home and abroad to partner with the Food4All Initiative, which aims to recruit and build a national grassroots agripreneurs and agri-food cooperative business network of six million smart farmers, especially youth and young women, in addition to older farmers in rural communities.
“These efforts are targeted towards tackling hunger, high food prices, unemployment, economic hardship and household poverty.
The funds raised through the Food4all Initiative will also help finance the FEEFUND,” Iyere said.
Speaking further on the initiative, Iyere said that the current hunger crisis in the country poses a huge health hazard to millions of Nigerians, especially children and other most vulnerable citizens.
He said further that apart from the health risks faced by Nigerians, the existing hunger crisis was a critical threat to Nigeria’s political stability, human productivity and national security. “It is a widely known fact that Nigeria is presently confronted with an acute food crisis for which many families are unable to feed themselves.
“If nothing is done to proactively avert a looming mass protest by hungry and angry Nigerians, the outcome of such a revolt by angry citizens will not be pleasant,” Iyere said.
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