Israel Partners Nigeria On Agriculture To Boost Food Production, Businesses.
By Ferdinand Olise
The Israeli Ambassador to Nigeria, Michael Freeman, has described Nigeria as a country blessed with extraordinary potential, which includes a young population with an entrepreneurial spirit, vast agricultural resources, and an unwavering determination to succeed.
Speaking in Abuja at the 78th Anniversary of the Independence of the State of Israel, Ambassador Freeman highlighted the partnership between Israel and Nigeria which he said is yielding positive results as young Nigerian entrepreneurs are working with Israeli and Nigerian mentors to transform ideas into businesses that create thousands of jobs.
According to him, Israeli companies are working in Nigeria to increase their investment in the agriculture sector, where Nigerian farmers are currently growing vegetables from Israeli seedlings on Nigerian soil, using Israeli technology.
“Through the iFAIR program, young Nigerian entrepreneurs are working with Israeli and Nigerian mentors to transform ideas into businesses that create thousands of jobs, millions of dollars of investment, and solve real-world challenges. And I am pleased to announce that we are committing to a fifth cohort of the program for 2027.”
“Imagine that success multiplied across Nigeria—higher yields, stronger rural communities, greater food security, and millions upon millions of lives improved,” Freeman added.
“We are expanding cooperation in innovation, agriculture, healthcare, security, education, and skills development because these are not acts of charity, they are investments in a shared future. The future of Israel–Nigeria relations will not be defined by speeches.
“It will be defined by entrepreneurs who build companies. Farmers, who increase their harvests, doctors and paramedics who save lives and young people who refuse to accept limitations, because when Nigerian ingenuity meets Israeli innovation, extraordinary things happen,” he said.
The Ambassador further stated that his country, despite successive years of hostility from its neighbours, has for the past 78 years been transforming deserts into farmland, scarcity into abundance, ideas into technologies, and challenges into opportunities.
“Israel’s greatest export is the belief that no challenge is too great, no obstacle is insurmountable, and no dream is beyond our reach when people of vision, courage, and determination work together.
Ambassador Freeman emphasised the commitment towards partnership between both countries, adding that the first seventy-eight years of the Independence of the State of Israel has contributed positively to the world, and still achieving more results.
