About 470 Community-Based Experience and Service (COBES) students of the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Ilorin (Unilorin), have supported their host communities with farming, health and teaching materials.
The university’s Dean of Faculty of Agriculture, Prof. Adebisi Fawole, stated this in Ilorin on Monday after visiting various benefiting communities in Kwara.
She explained that the communities spread across four Local Government Areas of Kwara, including Ilorin East, Asa, Ifelodun and Irepodun.
Fawole said that the items distributed to the communities included teaching and medical aids, farm sprays, community signposts and medical equipment.
She described the gesture as a way of giving back to their host communities for the caring opportunities the students enjoyed.
The dean commended members of the communities for hosting the students, while also applauding the students for adapting to the different environments.
She further encouraged the students to cultivate the habit of observing everywhere they found themselves, adding that the programme will facilitate the development of the communities.
“You are encouraged to always give respect to elders, learn some culture training, and make the best use of the opportunity,” she advised.
While comparing her experience to what the students had gone through in the communities, Fawole disclosed that the students should know that they were lucky in their various preferred environments.
“We are glad to bring you to a place where farming is being done; you can ask the farmers questions and contribute through what you have learned in class.
“For the privilege given to us in these areas, we are very happy, and we thank you,” she said.
In their different remarks, the students’ group leaders across the communities disclosed that they observed that the communities were faced with problems of electricity, healthcare, language barrier and transportation.
One of the COBES students, Ms Rebecca Adekola, said they were able to organise career talks to sensitise members of the communities, especially youths, on the need to go further in their education.
According to Adekola, she observed that the communities do not value education as most youths engage largely in farming and commercial motorcycle business in the city.
“Aside from the borehole water, which was drilled for the Ile-Apa community by a good Samaritan, which attracted immigrant farmers to stay, the community lack electricity,” she said.
In his remarks, the UNILORIN Faculty of Agriculture COBES Coordinator, Dr Lateef Adefalu, commended the students for making the faculty and, by extension, the university proud.
He urged them to keep to all the rules guiding their services.
