TracTrac Mechanisation Services has unveiled a Mechanisation Investment Facility aimed at supporting the deployment of 250,000 tractors across Nigeria and expanding access to agricultural machinery and services over the next five years.
The initiative is also expected to strengthen the capacity of 500,000 mechanisation service providers and support the establishment of 10 agricultural equipment assembly plants in Nigeria. The facility was unveiled at the TracTrac Mechanisation Investment Roadshow in Abuja.
TracTrac Chief Executive Officer, Godson Ohuruogu, said the financing platform was designed to accelerate investment in Nigeria’s agricultural mechanisation ecosystem by helping businesses acquire equipment, expand their operations and provide machinery services to farmers.
He said the initiative was necessary because Nigeria continues to face a significant mechanisation gap. According to him, the country has about seven tractors per 100 square kilometres of farmland, compared with 35 in Kenya and a global benchmark of 195.
Ohuruogu said about 90 percent of farming in Nigeria is still carried out manually, making access to appropriate machinery and sustainable financing important to increasing productivity and strengthening the country’s food system.
“We cannot close Nigeria’s mechanisation gap by treating mechanisation as a development ask,” Ohuruogu said. “We have to build an investable ecosystem around it, one that gives capital providers confidence, enables service providers to grow, and gives young Nigerians the opportunity to build and lead in the sector.”
He said the investment facility followed stakeholder roundtables held over the previous two months and built on the Improving Smallholder Farmers’ Access to Small Scale Agricultural Mechanisation Services (ISSAM) programme, implemented by TracTrac with support from the Mastercard Foundation.
TracTrac has also partnered with the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security to convene the 2026 National Agricultural Mechanisation Policy Dialogue, which brought together stakeholders to strengthen Nigeria’s policy and investment framework for agricultural mechanisation.
The roadshow brought together banks, government agencies, development finance institutions, foundations, private investors, equipment manufacturers and regulators to examine financing options for expanding mechanisation businesses.
Jemimah Justus, Investment and Asset Management Lead at TracTrac, said the facility was intended to create access to financing that has been limited through conventional lending channels.
She said the mechanism would enable institutions to lend and invest directly in mechanisation businesses, allowing them to acquire equipment, expand their operations and improve services to farmers.
The proposed expansion of mechanisation comes as Nigeria seeks to increase agricultural productivity and reduce dependence on manual farming. Limited access to machinery remains a constraint for many smallholder farmers, particularly those operating on small plots and in rural communities.
Beyond increasing access to tractors, the programme could also support the development of a domestic agricultural equipment ecosystem through assembly, maintenance, financing and mechanisation service businesses.
The planned deployment of 250,000 tractors represents a significant expansion of Nigeria’s mechanisation capacity. Its impact on farm productivity and food security will depend on access to affordable financing, availability of spare parts, technical expertise, suitable machinery and reliable services for farmers across the country.
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