Not less than N2 billion has been earmarked by the Ondo State government for the construction of 700 kilometres of roads in rural roads to ease the transportation of agricultural products in the State.
The Special Adviser to Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu on Rural and Community Development, Mr Kolawole Babatunde who disclosed this at the weekend said the State Community and Social Development Agency (ODCSDA) also secured N783 million grant as interventions in 48 communities and six vulnerable groups since March 2022 under Nigeria Covid-19 Action Recovery and Economic Stimulus (NG-CARES) programme.
Babatunde said the State government is set to begin the construction of 700 kilometres of rural roads across the state with the grant secured from the World Bank and the counterpart funding from the State government.
Speaking during an interaction with the Correspondents Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, (NUJ), Babatunde, who represented Akoko South East/Akoko South West Federal Constituency in the National Assembly said the 700 kilometres would be constructed under Rural Access and Marketing Project (RAAMP), a World Bank-assisted programme.
According to him, the road construction, which will be carried out in phases, would be funded through the World Bank and the state counterpart fund.
The former lawmaker, while explaining that state government keyed into RAAMP for ease of transporting agricultural products, stressed that revamping rural roads would help to reduce issues of food scarcity and grant access for the rural parts of the state for marketing and farming activities.
His words “This project will be broken down based on the roads we are intervening in and we have gotten about €3.5 million and about US$ 500,000.
This is aside from the N1.4 billion governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu has released as a counterpart fund to us. The way it works is that the funding has to get approval from the World Bank. We write to them stating the roads we are intervening in, the cost, then the World Bank will approve.”
Babatunde said since Akeredolu’s inauguration as governor, he has continued to show uncommon commitment to his pact with the people to ensure the transformation of the rural areas of the state through the Directorate of Rural and Community Development and the two World Bank-assisted Agencies under the Directorate; the Ondo State Community and Social Development Agency (ODCSDA) and the Rural Access and Agricultural Marketing Project (RAAMP).
His words “For every action we take as directorate and agency, we get the approval of Mr Governor first. Then, it comes to us, we finetune, and then it goes to the World Bank.
“As counterpart fund, we’ve gotten N1.4 billion and when a state pushes such amount, you could be rest assured of what will come in as World Bank intervention.
“We are not limited to the €3.5 million and the US$ 500,000, it is a pool. It depends on how we can fast-track our construction which will determine the number of the amount we will be able to access.
We have about 20 states in the project but it has been my prayer that we access more funds than any other state in the country so that we can have more rural roads.”
He noted that the present administration’s decision to be one of the participating states in RAAMP was borne out of the concerned attitude of Governor Akeredolu and the desire to change the negative narrative associated with getting access to the rural part of the state.
Babatunde noted that, for proper management of supply chains of agricultural products and raw materials from production to delivery to the consumer, the state would establish an agro-logistics hub across the three Senatorial districts of the state.
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