No fewer than two million vulnerable Nigerians, across the country, have benefited from projects implemented under the Federal Government's National Poverty Reduction with Growth Strategy, NPRGS, for the year 2022.

This was contained in a progress report presented at the NPRGS Steering Committee meeting, chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo at the Presidential Villa.

According to the report about 1.6 million smallholder farmers were also impacted under the Agriculture for Jobs Plan.

Updates from the committee meeting which took place on Wednesday, were made available to journalists, in a statement by the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Office of the Vice President, Mr. Laolu Akande.

The report further stated that 13,000 youths have been trained under a Technical and Vocational Education and Training programme in six states comprising Lagos, Ogun, Enugu, Gombe, Kaduna and Nasarawa, while arrangements were underway to provide similar training for 2000 beneficiaries in Edo State.

Equally, more than 8,000 Nigerians were employed in rural roads construction under the Rural Roads programme which built 40 rural roads in 120 communities, covering about 57.3 km across the country.

The NPRGS implementation monitoring update, presented by the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba, said: "Following the release of N50 billion, programmes that have achieved 100 per cent completion include: Agriculture for Food and Jobs Plan, AFJP, and Construction of Rural Roads, among others.

"A total number of direct beneficiaries of the implemented programmes currently stands at 1,818,782 vulnerable Nigerians and a total of 9,527 Nigerians have also been directly employed through the implementation of the programmes so far," he said.

The statement added that the committee approved the sum N250 billion for the execution of projects for the year 2023. Projects scheduled for implementation under the NPRGS for the year include:

Speaking to State House Correspondents after the meeting, Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State, who is also the Co-Chair of the Technical Working Group for the committee said, though implementation had not reached expected levels, efforts were underway to touch each of the targeted 15 areas of implementation.