By: Kamal Hammajo Adam
The Livestock Productivity and Resilience Support (L-PRES) project is one of the most ambitious Agricultural Reforms Nigeria has ever witnessed. Launched in 2022 with World Bank support, the six-year, $500 million initiative was designed to modernize livestock production, improve animal health, and reduce farmer, herder conflicts in 20 participating States.
Three years on, the program is beginning to show results. Yet, a closer look, particularly at Gombe State, reveals a picture of progress tempered by persistent challenges.
THE PROMISES DELIVERED
In Gombe, L-PRES has rolled out several practical interventions that speak directly to the needs of ordinary farmers.
• TRAINING AND TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER: More than 140 extension workers and dozens of farmers have been trained in artificial insemination, feed formulation, and pasture development. These sessions are slowly bridging the gap between traditional methods and modern livestock management.
• INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT: Nine livestock markets have been upgraded with veterinary stalls, sanitation facilities, and improved layouts. Over 100 solar-powered boreholes and rehabilitated earth dams now serve grazing reserves, easing pressure on scarce water resources.
• VETERINARY SERVICES: The establishment of a livestock diagnostic center and the approval of a new veterinary hospital place Gombe among the leading States in strengthening animal health services.
• ENVIRONMENTAL AND NUTRITIONAL SUPPORT: The distribution of 800 kilograms of fodder seeds and 20,000 tree seedlings has linked climate adaptation with better feed security, ensuring livestock productivity even under erratic weather patterns.
Together, these achievements have started to improve market access, reduce the costs of migration for herders, and strengthen peacebuilding in grazing communities.
THE GAPS THAT REMAIN
Despite these gains, the project’s impact is not without limitations.
• LIMITED REACH: Trainings that cover 67 farmers or a handful of extension workers at a time remain small compared to the thousands of livestock keepers in the State. The question of scale remains unresolved.
• SUSTAINABILITY RISKS: Boreholes, markets, and dams require long-term maintenance. Without clear management plans or reliable funding, infrastructure may deteriorate once donor funds dry up
• ADOPTION CHALLENGES: Technologies like digital tagging or artificial insemination remain costly and culturally unfamiliar. Smallholder farmers may hesitate to adopt them without subsidized or long-term support.
A BALANCED SCORECARD
From a balanced perspective, L-PRES in Gombe has created real, measurable progress. Farmers now have access to better markets, water, and veterinary services. Livestock productivity is improving, and conflict risks are being reduced through better resource management.
At the same time, the weaknesses are structural: limited reach, sustainability concerns, and the slow pace of adoption. Unless these gaps are addressed, the project risks delivering short-term relief rather than long-term transformation.
CONCLUSION
The L-PRES project, as seen in Gombe State, is best understood as a work in progress. It has laid important foundations, skills development, infrastructure, and conflict-sensitive interventions, that directly benefit communities. But the challenge lies in expanding these gains, ensuring they endure, and embedding them into local systems beyond donor funding.
For now, L-PRES offers a rare opportunity: the chance to turn livestock farming in Gombe, and by extension Nigeria, from a subsistence activity into a sustainable economic driver. Whether this opportunity is fully realized will depend on how well current progress is scaled, sustained, and integrated into everyday rural life, under the weight of Nigeria's familiar governance challenge.
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