Festival: Nigeria to host ECOWAS key players to address food, security challenges

Nigeria will host key players in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) countries to address security challenges that hindered farming and agricultural production in the ECOWAS countries, official has said.

Amb. Felix Ihonre, the Director-General, ECOWAS Food and Cultural Festival, disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on the sidelines of the Preparatory/Inter-ministerial meeting on the festival in Abuja.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the ECOWAS Food and Cultural Festival is scheduled to be held in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State from October 6 to 11, 2024.

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Ihonre said that the festival would bring together key players in the food security and security structure to proffer solutions to security challenges that hindered farming and agricultural production in Nigeria and other West African countries.

“Nigeria being the host of the ECOWAS Food and Cultural Festival scheduled to be held in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State from Oct. 6 to Oct. 11, 2024 has a lot to gain in areas of tourism, sustainable development, cultural integration, poverty alleviation, youth employment, women in agriculture.

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“The essence of having the festival is for a high level governments’ policies advocacy and high level commitment from the governments within the ECOWAS sub region.

“We are stimulating from all sectors of the economy to ensure that once there is synergy among key players, the issues of insecurity, hunger, malnutrition, and issue of eradicating violence within agricultural territory and environment will be addressed.”

The EFCF boss said once the government was able to stop the violence in various communities, farmers would go to farms without molestation or harassment.