Food Security: USAID Supports Nigeria With $3 million Grants

<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Food Security has receives attention<&sol;em><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">OpenLife Nigeria<&sol;a><&sol;strong> reports that barley 72 hours when governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State raised the alarm about the unnoticed nose diving curve of the Nigerian economy&comma; the United States Agency for International Development&comma; USAID&comma; has risen to the challenged&period;<br &sol;>&NewLine;In a statement made available to OpenLife Nigeria&comma; the agency in Nigeria has launched a COVID-19 Food Security Challenge that will provide &dollar;3 million in grant funding and technical assistance to youth-led and mid-stage companies working in food value chains in Nigeria&period;<br &sol;>&NewLine;Application for the grant opens April 12 to May 9&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>According to the agency&comma; Nigeria is experiencing food insecurity compounded by the COVID-19 global pandemic and its effects on the food value chain in the country&period; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;wsj&period;com&sol;">The pandemic<&sol;a> has disrupted already fragile agricultural value chains&comma; especially smallholder farmers’ ability to produce&comma; process&comma; and distribute food&period; This disrupts agricultural productivity and markets&comma; and negatively impacts livelihoods&comma; especially among vulnerable households&comma; women&comma; and youth&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We are launching the COVID-19 Food Security Challenge to help innovative Nigerians alleviate food insecurity&comma;” USAID Mission Director Anne Patterson said&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;This assistance encourages private sector-led solutions to boost food production&comma; processing&comma; and create market linkage along the agriculture value chain in a sustainable way across <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">Nigeria<&sol;a>&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In launching the Challenge&comma; USAID seeks commercially viable youth-led and mid-stage companies already working in food production&comma; processing&comma; and distribution&period; Successful applicants will present ideas that demonstrably help farmers and other stakeholders in the agricultural value chain increase agricultural productivity and food security within the next six months&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The Challenge will award 15 to 25 youth-led companies up to &dollar;75&comma;000 each and award 10 to15 mid-stage companies up to &dollar;150&comma;000 each&period; Winners will receive funding and technical assistance to rapidly expand their activities to mitigate the effect of COVID-19 on Nigeria’s food value chain and improve the resilience of vulnerable households to the negative impacts of the<&sol;p>&NewLine;