Director of ECOWAS Youth and Sports Development Centre visits Nyaniberi

The director of the ECOWAS Youth and Sports Development Centre in Burkina Faso, Francis Chuks Njoaguani, visited the Nyaniberi farm sites in Serrekundanding last Wednesday.

Mr Njoaguani made the visit to the West Coast Region to assess how best the Burkina Faso centre may assist with future youth training programmes.

The Nyaniberi farm sites are run by The Gambia’s National Youth Service Scheme (NYSS) as an agricultural development and training centre. Activities at the farm include crop production, horticulture, bee keeping, poultry farming, aquaculture, processing of fish, small ruminant farming and food processing.

Mr Njoaguani applauded The Gambia for its hospitality and appeared impressed with what he had seen, particularly the structures on the ground and farm plantation.

During the visit, Mr Njoaguani told representatives of the Ministry of Youth and Sports that ECOWAS is looking at diversifying training programmes. Currently, ECOWAS has two centres within the West African region: Songhai Centre in Benin, which is targeted at agriculture, and another one in Mali, where young men and women are training to become electricians.

He added that ECOWAS deems it fitting after conducting training for five years to expand the training programmes.

Cherno Barra Touray, the NYSS board chairman, has called on ECOWAS to give all necessary support for the development of the Gambian youths.