OSUN 2026: K-RAD Unveils Bold Industrial Agriculture Blueprint to Drive Prosperity and Food Security

In fulfilling his promise to run a gubernatorial aspiration driven by a structured and well-thought-out, implementable sector-by-sector plan, Kunle Rasheed Adekunle, popularly known as K=RAD, has begun serializing a policy plan for Osun’s prosperity, focusing on the agriculture sector.  

 

My Plan for Agricultural Breakthrough for Osun State

An increase in population does not call for an increase in the number of people on the farm.

In 1798, the British economist, Thomas Malthus explained to the world that the population tends to grow at geometric rates (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 54, etc.), doubling every 25 years, while agricultural production grows at a liner or arithmetical rate of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

At some point, population growth will outpace food production growth, resulting in food scarcity and increased prices. This leads to hunger, and hunger leads to all sorts of social problems like diseases, children with poorly formed brains who remain unintelligent for life, crime, family troubles, and if left unchecked, conflicts. Such a society will fall into the Malthusian Trap, marked by signs of imminent collapse or an actual, final collapse.

The slow rate of food production occurs because of the wrong strategy of increasing the number of people on the farm. The call for people to ‘go back to the farm’ is so common even in government circles that it is difficult for people to believe it when they are told, as I wish to inform you now, that it is wrong and does not work. Or has it worked so far in your lifetime?

The correct response to the challenge of feeding an increasing population is to industrialize the farming systems. To industrialize means to engage in the prudent use of machines, employ best practices as advised by research, apply fertilizers, and follow good farming practices that have roots in science. This is the bedrock of the pivotal change my administration, will implement in Osun, once we get in the saddle by your support under the will of God.

This is aside from the adoption of a robust approach to land management between the traditional landowners who have land but are doing nothing with it and the investors who need the land but do not have access to it.

A good look at the use of machines shows that the costliest aspect of farming is land clearing, and here is the part that farmers need the greatest assistance with. There are others of course, like seed planting and harvesting. But land clearing comes first.

What we will do is simply undertake land clearing for farmers in the first year. This will comprise three operations in one:

a. The removal of the vegetation (bushes)

b. The removal of the roots of the bushes

c. The removal of stones and rocks from the farmland.

This is a very expensive operation, but we will do it because we understand there is a need for it if we are going to help our farmers produce more, remain in good health, and be much more prosperous.

You may be wondering why remove the roots of trees and bushes from the soil.

It is necessary because without getting rid of those tree roots, you cannot deploy the machines that will plant or plow apply fertilizers, or conduct the weeding process later in the farming operations. It is the same reason all stones and pebbles must be removed from the soil. It will pave the way for the plow, harrows, etc., and open up the farm for the use of smaller, simpler machines for other farming operations.

We will clear plow and seed at least 500 hectares of land in each Local Government Area in our first year and triple the performance in Year two. We will keep increasing this acreage until we have implemented this program on all arable lands in Osun State.

Data shows that the average size of farms in Osun State is 3 acres. This is standard in most of the Southern Nigerian states due to a lack of mechanization. Only the tree crop farms are larger due to seasonality, which reduces the workload in plantations.

Our Industrial Farming Programme will increase this average from 3 to 10 acres. Our target is that the smallest full-time farmer, male or female, will be cultivating nothing less than 10 acres with less labor and time than what they were putting into 3 acres aforetime.

There is more. We will also cause the yield to increase fourfold per acre so that whereas the farmer got a yield of half a ton to 1 ton per acre as is the case right now, we will raise this yield to four tons. The combined effect of an increase in the size of the farm and yield per area will push agricultural productivity sky-high.

In line with the example we have been using, an average farmer who is getting 3 tons of corn at this time on his three acres will be able to get 12 tons, and with his farm expanded to 10 acres, he will get 120 tons of corn a year. This is our target and our reliable promise, based on results to be realized by applying the incredible force multiplier of machines and the scientific method.

Our Means and Methods:

i Employment of machines

ii. Employment of improved seeds/planting materials/cultivars

iii. Engagement of well-trained Extension Officers

IV. Collaboration with our many universities and research institutes

V. Improved coordination at the Ministry of Agriculture.

 

Livestock Programme

My administration will pay attention to all aspects of agriculture across the board. But we will tackle specific aspects that pose a great challenge to our society as a whole and that have manifested huge markets begging for supplies.

The most important of these is dairy.

Five years ago, a gram of milk powder sold for about N2. At this time, one gram of milk powder costs N15 in Nigeria. This has drastically reduced milk intake among our children and adults. The danger here is that when children do not take enough milk and do not take other proteins as substitutes, their brains will be underdeveloped.

A generation with underdeveloped brains means the collapse of society soon.

My administration has made a comprehensive plan to address milk production in the state. This will begin with aggregating raw milk from the community of cattle owners in the state who are present in appreciable numbers in the West and Central Senatorial zones of the state. This raw milk will be professionally processed and converted to milk powder, evaporated milk, and similar formats for packaging for sale in the open market.

This will lead to an expanded program where an improved and identified cattle breed will be introduced to the state under an accelerated breeding program, where one cow will produce more than two calves in a year.

A household-based structure will be developed where each household will own at least two cows, and the milk will be sold daily to itinerant milk collectors who will pay on the spot. The milk collector will also supply the animal feed to the cattle owner, and this will all run on a credit system, paid for with raw milk. This will make both the cost of acquisition and ownership affordable to households. The program will be organized such that the basic requirement will be just a fenced plot, a basic investment in the project, and a cooperative society membership.

The implementation of this program will lead to an increase in crop production and enable the government to stand as Buyer of Last Resort to crop farmers so that no harvest can be stranded.

Animal feed production will rise. Our people will save money not just as cash but as animals – a smart method to save and escape from inflation or difficulty in converting to cash. We will increase household wealth tremendously in so doing.

Our Means and Methods:

i. Engagement of the latest dairy animals

ii. Engagement of advanced breeding techniques

iii. Involvement of Households for direct benefits and wealth creation.

iv. Engagement of well-trained veterinary health officials

v. Less involvement of middlemen.

Our target is to make sure that 80% of households in Osun have at least two milk cows, each valued at about N3 million. This means a household dairy cattle population of about 2 million in the state, producing at least 30 million liters of milk in a day, which translates to N15,000 per day for each household in the state.