staff of financial institutions to increase their understanding of the agriculture sector and its inherent potentials and orientate them on how to access available risk sharing and risk management instruments at NIRSAL. In 2021, NIRSAL developed several agribusiness models and collaborated with banks and financial institutions for the development of financing frameworks and financing product papers for the de-risked financing of Agro Geo-Cooperatives®, Trader Geo-Cooperatives and Marketing Geo-Cooperatives, with other products still in the works. Additionally, NIRSAL has developed five innovative index-based agricultural insurance products to deliver real value to agricultural value chain actors, and manage credit risks for lenders and investors as against the previous mono indemnity-based product that was available in the country before NIRSAL. As a result of NIRSAL’s intervention, nine (9) private insurance companies now have the approval of the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) to sell the NIRSALfacilitated index-based agricultural insurance products. Over 1.9 million farmer subscriptions have been recorded for the products since 2018. NIRSAL is still developing more products 19 www. ceotodaymagazine . com Niger ia for more effective field risk management in agriculture. NIRSAL has contributed significantly to the increase in bank lending to agriculture from 1.4% to 5.2% as of Q4 2020, and has completed the development of Climate Risk Profiles (CRPs) for an initial 6 of 15+ specified, market-based agricultural commodities. These are comprehensive guides to investing in the production of some select Industrial, Consumer and Export commodities in climate-challenged environments. This is projected to be a useful guide to our agricultural stakeholders for the next 40 years at a minimum. We estimate that NIRSAL’s finance facilitation efforts have generated an additional $2.5 billion worth of economic activity through agricultural products/outputs and other value chain economic activities. NIRSAL’s Credit Risk Guarantee beneficiaries attest to 20-60% increase in capacity utilization, productivity, number of markets served and sales value, and NIRSAL has been receiving overtures from other African countries to provide consulting support for the establishment and implementation of Risk Sharing facility models in their respective jurisdictions. What challenges have you faced as head of NIRSAL during these endeavours? Some of the challenges faced in the execution of NIRSAL’s innovative solutions include: • Limitation of NIRSAL’s Risk Sharing Fund; • Difficulty in securing large expanses of unencumbered agricultural land; • Inadequate investments in land development and parcellation;
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