The Pioneer Vice Chancellor of Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, (MOUAU), Abia State, Prof. Placid Njoku has challenged researchers at the institution to focus on how wheat, Onion, apple, lettuce, carrot, and sorghum can be massively produced in Abia and other states in the south east.
He flayed academics “who sit and wait for research ideas to drop like manna,” urging them to wake up and hasten their names in the book of knowledge and progress.
Njoku, who stated this while delivering the university’s eighth Convocation lecture titled: “Furthering Knowledge: Potentiating Food And Security For National Development”, he said the mandate of agriculture universities should imply that the universities’ curricula involve intensive teaching and extensive practical training in agriculture, with their research objectives imperatively tailored to be relevant to the needs of farmers and local agriculture.
“In essence, the mission of Agriculture Universities pontificates intensive teaching, extensive practical training, research relevant to local agriculture, and extension through prompt delivery of customized technologies to confident entrepreneurial farmers.
