The Cross River State government says about seventeen thousand cocoa, oil palm and coffee farmers will be registered across the state through the State Traceability System.
Victoria Omini
This was disclosed in Calabar during the stakeholders engagement on the implementation of the Cross River State Traceability System.
Declaring the engagement open, Johnson Ebokpo, the Commissioner for Agriculture said the registration is in line with requirements of the European Union Deforestation Regulation, EUDR.
"Global agricultural trade is undergoing significant reform. The European Union Deforestation Recommission now requires that commodities such as cocoa and other forestry products entering the EU market must be proven to be deforestation free and fully resilient to the environment.
"Our objective is to establish credible technology that captures farmland data, integrates geolocation mapping, strengthens aggregation structures and positions across the state.
"Our aspiration is to become Nigeria's national traceability hub", he said.
Hon. Ebokpo also acknowledged the support from Pula Advisors, the Lead Consultants for the Traceability Programme, for building technical capacity that meets international standards.
Williams Archibong, the Director General of the Cross River Geographic Information Agency said his agency which is the custodian of all geography information in the state is 100% behind the exercise.
Dr. Adewole Bello, the Country Field Team Lead of Pula Advisors said they will collect the EUDR and traceability compliance data on seventeen thousand farmers in seventeen local government areas across the state.
He also disclosed that the Mavuno Tech setup will be deployed for the exercise and geo coordinates data will be used to precisely identify the precise location of a farm.
The primary driver of the Cross River State Traceability System is the EUDR which mandates that agriculture commodities exported to the European Union must be traceable to the exact farm boundary, legally produced and verifiably deforestation free.
Introduced in 2023, the EUDR is a set of rules that aim to end deforestation linked to the production of certain cash crops.
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