Ini Billie, Uyo
An agricultural and food engineering expert, Prof. Akindele Alonge has said innovations in the field of study would offer solutions to a wide range of food security challenges in the country.
Speaking on Thursday in Uyo during the 87th Inaugural lecture of the University of Uyo titled “Eating What is Good: The Agricultural and Food Engineers Perspective”, Alonge sought for the recognition of the discipline as a vital strategy to tackle the problem of food insecurity.
“No serious agricultural production can take place without mechanisation and there cannot be mechanisation without agricultural engineering. Agricultural engineering is an important discipline for innovation and delivery of solutions to a wide range of food security challenges, and needs to be recognised as part of the Nigeria strategy,” he said.
Alonge who is also the National Chairman, Nigerian Institution of Agricultural Engineering stated that the institution has taken proactive steps to tackle the menace of youth unemployment in the country.
He mentioned one of the steps to include the setting up of a committee to impart practical skills that would make students more employable upon graduation.
He stated that the organisation has worked with the Nigerian University Commission to review the curriculum of students, adding that the institution is interfacing with relevant bodies to train students on entrepreneurship.
“As the National chairman of NIAE, we are taking proactive steps to provide solutions to the myriads of challenges facing us. This include setting up committee to impart practical skills that will make students more employable upon graduation.
“We have worked with NUC to review the curriculum at the undergraduate level and this will come up very soon. We are collaborating with some organisations to get students trained in entrepreneurship. Through our professional development committee, we are training and building capacity of our members and other skilled and semi-skilled people,” he stated.
The professor explained that eating what is good starts from production to processing and then storage and packaging.
He stated that he has made modest contributions in processing what is to be eaten by harnessing and optimizing energy from the sun for drying of crops; developing machines that could process some agricultural produce and storing them.
He stressed the need to modernise agriculture by leveraging on digital technology to improve production, processing, storage and packaging of agricultural produce.
Don seeks innovation to end food insecurity
