Ondo State Governor, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu (SAN), has sought the collaboration of the World Bank to ensure better rural roads for the use of farmers across the state in order to transport their farm produce to the markets without difficulties.
Akeredolu made this known during a courtesy visit by World Bank representatives led by Professor Foluso Okunmadewa, held at the Governor's Office in Akure.
He said his administration was ready to take bold steps to ensure that the State witness development with intergrated rural roads leading to farms.
"We have given our promise and we will ensure that our farms have good roads to the market. Rural roads development is critical to agriculture which we hope to use to catalyze our economy.
"We have decided to key into that because we are serious about agriculture and roads is one of the major problems. Bad roads can be discouraging," he said.
He explained further that with the assistance of the World Bank, major improvements would be made.
"We look forward to a robust relationship with you, one that will benefit the people of the state," he said.
Earlier in his address, leader of the World Bank team, Professor Foluso Okunmadewa, assured the Governor of a robust working relationship between the state and the global financial institution.
"We are here to assure you that Ondo State can key into new opportunities that are on ground and are planned for State Governments in Nigeria.
"We have some projects already in the state in terms of partnership and relationship.
Okunmadewa mentioned the projects to include the Nigeria State Health Investment Project (NSHIP); the FADAMA project, the Public Service Reform Project (PSRP); the Community and Social Development (CSDP) Project and Rural Access and Mobility Project ( RAMP).
"In actual fact, we have three state level projects and one federal project that is active.
The Rural Access and Mobility Project (RAMP), the new Map project which the state is highly qualified for and education project which the state could also benefit from.
"To make it easier for the state to be able to participate actively, we need to look at the performances of the existing projects", he said.
He added that there are quite a lot of resources within the projects which he thinks the state can quickly harness and disburse to development interventions in the state.
The team leader, however stated that the visit of the team was to assure the governor of their preparedness to work with the Governor's team to resolve any constraint on the existing projects, so that the state could successfully utilize the resources that already exist and get some of the projects moving as quickly as possible.
