Nigeria’s Akinwumi Adesina named 2013 Forbes Africa person of the year

The 2013 Forbes Africa person of the year award has gone to Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Akinwumi Adesina. Adesina’s initiatives in agriculture have empowered about six million farmers across Nigeria to embrace modern day agriculture.

In January, Mr Adesina announced a scheme to hand out 10 million mobile phones to farmers to "drive an agriculture revolution" so they can find out the latest market information. In his acceptance speech, Adesina said "my goal is to make as many millionaires, maybe even billionaires, from agriculture as possible."

The Person of the Year award ceremony took place on Monday at a Nairobi Hotel and it is meant to celebrate “the individual who, for better or worse, has had the most influence on events of the year gone by”.

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