Mr Daniel Alozie, LIFE-ND State Project Accountant, addressing participants at the event in Umuahia on Friday
By Leonard Okachie
The Abia State Project Coordinating Office of the Livelihood Improvement Family Enterprises for Niger Delta (LIFE-ND) has trained some farmers on keeping basic accounting records.
Participants in the one-day training at the project’s headquarters in Umuahia on Friday were farmers who engage in the production, processing and marketing of the selected commodities in their communities.
The beneficiaries consisted of the project’s trainers, otherwise known as incubators, and the executives of the Commodity Apex Development Association (CADA) across the communities of the project’s implementation.
The State Project Accountant, Mr Daniel Alozie, said that it is important to train the new incubators (trainers) who were engaged last year to take care of the project’s 900 beneficiaries.
A cross section of participants at the event
According to him, the primary purpose is because “we discovered over time that most incubation centres did not have records to buttress their expenditures.
He explained that the incubators are people that train the project’s beneficiaries in different agricultural commodities and management.
Alozie said that they made sure that the resource persons could bring down the teaching to the level of somebody who did not pass through the four walls of higher institutions.
“At this point of our project implementation, it is necessary that we keep them abreast of what is happening with respect to the basic accounting records.
“A lot of funds have been sent to the incubators'(trainers) accounts and we keep on funding them as the project implementation progresses,” he said.
A resource person, Mr Philip Obinna, who taught them the importance of book keeping, described book keeping as the life wire of a business.
According to him, proper book keeping will help the farmer to know the financial statement, whether he or she is doing well or not.
Another resource person, Mr Lawrence Ubani, taught them “How to prepare simple cash book and bank reconciliation.”
He explained that such an important exercise would make them to keep the record of all their entries after which they reconcile it with their bank statements later.
A participant, Mrs Elizabeth Deliverer, who is the Managing Director of Delver Farms in Osisioma Local Government Area, said she benefitted a lot from the training.
“Most of us do not keep records but now I have learnt how to keep my cash, sales and purchases to move forward,” Deliverer said.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that LIFE-ND is being funded by International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), in collaboration with the Federal Government and Niger Delta Development Commission as well as the Abia state government.
The project, which is in line with President Muhammadu Buhari’s vision for national food security, is being implemented in the nine Niger Delta states. (NAN) (www.nannews.ng)
Edited by Ifeyinwa Okonkwo/Vincent Obi
