Gombe State recently achieved an impressive milestone by climbing to 4th place nationwide in the World Bank-financed Nigeria Covid-19 Action and Economic Recovery Stimulus (NG-CARES) programme.
This significant improvement from 7th place in 2023 and 17th place in 2022 is a clear indication of Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya’s commitment to uplifting the lives and livelihood of the people.
Locally renamed as “GO-CARES,” the programme, with 4 elements, has positively impacted over 400,000 individuals and families, focusing on rebuilding livelihoods, boosting food security, and improving resilience in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic’s devastating effects on the overall economy of individuals and households.
So far in Gombe State, over 400,000 individuals and families have directly or indirectly benefitted from one or more of the intervention areas.
Under Result Area 1, about 20,000 individuals have benefitted from cash transfers consistently for at least 6 months, more than 60,000 have received a one-off cash grant of 20,000, 30,000 or 50,000 naira. Under LIPW, about 15,000 individuals have been engaged to support various community efforts such as tree planting, environmental sanitation amongst others.
Similarly, over 200 communities have been supported in the construction of clinics, blocks of classrooms, boreholes, culverts, nutrition support packages etc under the community and social development agency with over 100, 000 indirect beneficiaries.
Under Result Area 2, more than 120,000 beneficiaries have benefitted from various agricultural inputs and assests distributed through the registered Farmer Cooperative Associations (FCA’s) in the state. These include bags of fertilizer, improved seedlings, herbicides, small ruminant animals, poultry birds etc. Indirectly, over 50 communities have been impacted with rehabilitation/construction of water harvesters, culverts and drainages and provision of wet markets in various communities across the state.
Under Result Area 3, about 8,000 direct beneficiaries have been supported with ICT gadgets such as laptop computers, tablets and router devices to enable them start up micro businesses. Others have received micro enterprises grants upto 100,000 to support their existing businesses.