This was disclosed in Abuja, on Thursday, by the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Akinwumi Adesina, while addressing the press after a breakfast meeting with banks and stakeholders in the agriculture sector.
He said the fund would be used to improve the cassava bread production and training of master bakers.
He also disclosed that so far, the ministry had trained over 385 master bakers in the six geopolitcal zones of the country, adding that its target was to train 3,000 master bakers.
The minister added that the agriculture sector had attracted a total $8 billion in the last two years, while the private sectors had executed $4 billion out of the $8 billion on seeds, fertilisers, rice, juice and others.
He recalled that between 1980 and 2010, the federal and state governments lost N776 billion because the government was buying and selling fertilisers to farmers, adding that with the new development, seeds and fertilisers were being directly sold by companies to farmers through the e-wallet system.
Adesina, however, said that the partnership between the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Ministry of Agriculture had moved the sector forward in the last two years.
He said the agriculture sector had borrowed about N3.5 billion from banks in the country, which was captured by the seeds, fertilisers companies and agro-dealers.
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