Farmers in northwestern Borno State have expressed some sighs of relief as they experienced the first rainfall after months of waiting
“It has not rained for over a month and we are happy that it rained today. We pray for blessings and may God give us more rain,” the female farmer told HumAngle in a video interview.
Another female farmer who spoke excitedly noted that she had been farming for the past six years.
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“We have cultivated the land and planted the crop but they all wilted away because of lack of rainfall,” she said. “We are grateful we prayed to God for rainfall and have gotten it.”
“We are thankful that it rained today because we have stayed for months without rainfall, crops have begun to wither especially those planted in porous soil areas,” she added.
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She said further: “Our groundnuts have wilted nothing was left unaffected but we are grateful that it has rained. We pray for a blessed season.”
A male farmer clad in a Yellow shirt spoke about the prolonged dry season affected him and his fellows.
“If it had not rained, all our farm products would have got damaged,” he said. “Some parts of the field have dried up already, a few parts survived because of the early plantation. Our crops like ground nuts and maize were the only crops that resisted the rain shortage.”
“Some maize and millets were completely wilted and we cannot replace them we can only plant beans to replace them on the field,” he added.
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In the face of the prolonged dry season, farmers in the community turned to God and offered prayers which were led by different religious leaders.
“We started offering alms when we started experiencing a shortage of rainfall both male and female some prepared pap while others made food we also did some traditional arm practice,” another female farmer said. “There was nothing we have not tried for prayers we thank God things have changed.”
Another young farmer expressed his joy about the rainfall.
“We are experiencing food inflation but we hope to get something from the field
“The problems we are facing now it is over a month, we have prayed to God and it has rained, we have prayed a lot,” he said.
