Fund supports households, formal and informal sectors
By Ologeh Joseph Chibu
In order to cushion the effect of the economic meltdown, the Ekiti State Governor, Mr. Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji, has approved N12b intervention fund plus another N1b set aside for food production.
The funds were raised through prudent and meticulous state creative expenditure.
The NI billion agriculture fund will be driven by the Ministry of Agricture with significant presence in all the Local Government and Local Council Development Areas, (LCDA)
It consists of a set of carefully designed relief programmes to alleviate the hardship being experienced by the people of the state in the face of the current global economic meltdown.
These programmes include the payment of one month salary arrears to State and Local Government workers totalling over N2.7 billion.
With this payment, the Government has cleared the salary backlog and will ensure the arrears owed Local Government workers are cleared this year.
A statement made available to Irohinoodua and signed by Special Adviser, (Media) Mr Yinka Oyebode said the Governor also approved an increase of N600 million per month in the subvention of autonomous institutions including the Judiciary and all tertiary institutions. This is to allow the institutions implement the wage award being implemented for State and Local Government workers.
In the same vein, Governor Oyebanji also approved the payment of two months pension arrears owed State and Local Government workers totalling N1.5 billion, as well as N100 million monthly gratuity payment to state pensioners and an increment of the current N50 million monthly gratuity to local Government pensioners to N100 million. (This brings total monthly gratuity payment to N200 million).
The State Government has also committed the sum of N1 billion to improve food production, especially to embark on land preparation, driven by the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security’s tractorization subsidy scheme, and an input supply programme to support small scale farmers. Similarly, the Government is also committing a whopping sum of N1.2 billion it recently got as first tranche of the World Bank-financed Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support ( L-PRES) Project to transform the livestock subsector.