The International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) said it has budgeted about $5.5 million to train more than 10, 000 agro-dealers in Nigeria on agro-chemical safety over a three year period.

Country Representative of IFDC, Scot Wallace disclosed this in yesterday in Abuja at the opening ceremony of its two-day Agro Dealer Certification Training on Crop protection Products (CPPs).

Mr. Wallace said the center chose to train agro dealers because of the close contact they have with the local farmers and are expected to teach the farmers what to do to avoid food poisoning by chemicals used on crops for preservation or crop improvement.

He said: "We have over 10,000 agro dealers and we are looking at a long term partnership with stakeholders like the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), the Alliance for Green revolution in Africa and Crop life Nigeria among others."

He explained that certificates of competency and attendance would be given to participants at the end of the training which would make them eligible to distribute chemicals in Nigeria through NAFDAC.

The Director General of NAFDAC Dr. Paul Orhii insisted that only those that have received the training and the certificates would be allowed to practice agro dealing in Nigeria as part of measures of safeguarding the health and lives of Nigerians and to avoid repeated cases of food poisoning especially in beans.

President of the North-Central Agro Input Dealers Association (NOCAIDA) Raufu Lawal said those selected for the training have been strategically selected so that they would be able to pass on what they learn from the training to the grass root farmers.

Also speaking, the president of Crop Life Nigeria Sam Kunu said the agriculture sector in Nigeria is one that needs to be supported by all stakeholders and agro chemical training is a tripod of crop plant in Nigeria.

A test is to be conducted for the 50 participants at training before the certificate would be issued based on performance.

Other supporters of the program are Fidelity Bank, Bank PHB and the National Food Reserve Agency. The training would also be conducted in Kano, Ogoja and Enugu.