….as varsity trains staff, students in drone technology, begins 19 hectares plantation
By Wole Balogun
An unrivalled green revolution has already begun in the Federal University Oye-Ekiti (FUOYE) courtesy of the Vice-Chancellor of the upwardy mobile varsity, Prof. Abayomi Sunday Fasina.
The green revolution is represented by the massive cultivation of ten hectares where maize, palm oil, cassava and other crops have been planted. There are five hectares of the plantation on the main campus in Oye-Ekiti and another five hectares on the Ikole-Ekiti campus.
The VC also revealed that the University management is planning to start another farm of five hectares in Erinmope-Ekiti in nearest future.
The green revolution project, according to Prof. Fasina, is to position FUOYE as first, the food basket of Ekiti State and very soon, that of the nation.
While the massive plantation is on going, the University has also organised a drone technology training for the staff and students. Tagged: “Drones in Agricultural Development” the training has a drone technology cum Agriculture expert, Mr. Femi Adekoya, as the lead resource person among other experts.
Speaking on Tuesday about his visions and missions with the green revolution, he said: “We are thinking on creating enabling environment for agriculture in the University. The reason why most of our youths are involvedi n the Japa syndrome, is because the environment is not conducive for them. This is what we are doing, to make the environment conducive for them. This training is meant to
discuss the latest trends and development in drone technology and how this can contribute to our agricultural development.
Prof. Segun Olubode who is the brain behind this training is on Sarbatical with us.
You do not just come for sarbatical but you are expected to add value to the institution. People want to see what you are adding to the system. Prof. Olubode gave us the idea of this drone technology training, that is how he is adding value. We urge people to join us to develop FUOYE. We have two visions for this year, we will have hectares of oil palm, cassava and maize on the field .
I have led the team of green revolution on this campus.we have cultivated five hectares in Ikole and five in Oye. We want to see what everyone would do to add value to the University and uphold ethics of profession, work and and others.
We have already on ground in 12 towns in Ekiti and we are going to more towns, we are soon going to Erinmope and we will replicate what we have as farm here in Erinmope.
We need more hands on deck to develop this University. lt is only you and l that can bring this change into fruition.
Through my fellowship in Austria, l have got the gagdets on the latest technology to develop agriculture in FUOYE. Once the stream A students complete their exam in May 29, they will go into training in computer studies such as software development, system analysis among others.
We want to empower our students with the necessary entrepreneurial skills so that they can become employers of labour instead of seeking for employment.
This training is both theory an d practical.
When you have a vision as a leader, you want to make sure the vision succeeds and is realized. As stakeholders, we don’t want any Aluta again on this campus. We want developmental projects. We are having so many students coming to study here because we have a stable calendar and relatively cheap school fees.
In terms of quality of training, FUOYE ranks best in Nigeria.
In the present day, when compared with varsities established with us , FUOYE is number one.
“As stakeholders, cooperate with us and make sure we excel as a varsity. I will not compromise on quality and standard of education for my students. I want nothing short of the best for them. Let us maintain peace on campus. If there is anyone harrasing students, there are channels for complaints, students too should not harrass the lecturers especially in your dressing and mannerisms,” he counselled.
While introducing the training, Mr. Adekoya aka the flying farmer, who is the Country Representative in deploying technology for positioning agriculture , disclosed that FUOYE is the first public University to engage him to train her staff and students on the use of drone technology for developing agriculture.
He said the VC’s initiative with the programe shows how the varsity is prepared to prepare the current generation for the best.
Addressing the students, he said: ” FUOYE is poised to offer you the best opportunity to be relevant in your respective industries
Drone technology is one that is transforming the landscape of agriculture, agriculture is one of the mainstay of Nigerian economy in Nigeria.
If you have the opportunity to listen to industry exposure, more important you have the first responsibility to develop yourselves, lecturers will only give what they have, you need to get more for your self to be the best.
60 percent of Nigerian population are engaged in agriculture but we have challenges of agriculture. Some of these are low productivity, negative perception of youths to agriculture, there is the need to meet the future demands by 2050 when the world’s population will increase 9 billion, we have to in crease food production by 70 percent,l and lastly, agriculture is the list digitalized of all sectors of all industries currently in Nigeria.
I see a future of agriculture where technology will be main the thing for agricultural development. These include concepts like farm to cloud, livestock live, Uber agricbokts and others. This training will answer questions such as how does drones come into the picture of agriculture development?, how will it revolutionize agriculture?. How can we achieve 70 percent more food using drone technology?. Why are drones becoming very important to the development?, Why do we have to pay attention to this technology?
some of the advantages of drones are they are cheap in terms of acquisition costs, they cost much less than the aircraft to acquire, they are smart and portable,
they can be used for ease of on-demand date acquisition or collection. There are several up to date aspects of drone technologyThere is the remote censor system used to assess the health of crops. We need up to date drones reduces labour intensity.