After the civil war, Gowon came up with post-war corrective measures of which the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme was one. The scheme was enacted to eradicate the mutual distrust that resulted from the war and to create social reorientation, political re-socialisation, ethnic tolerance, mutual understanding and foster national unity among Nigerians irrespective of regional, religious and ethnic differences.

Thirty-five years into its establishment, I believe it still stands as one of the most truly enriched national assignments one can render to Mother Nigeria. The scheme was designed to deploy graduates from one region of the country to another and throughout the one-year mandatory service period, corps members are assigned to respective places of human and social endeavours to carry out their national assignments with dedication, selflessness and humility. Through this, social values are exchanged and mutual distrust is reduced or even eradicated among the corps members in particular and with their serving communities in general.

There are many things that make the NYSC scheme unique among all national assignments. First, there's no other gathering of people in Nigeria that combines virtually all the ethnic and tribal representations at least twice in a year like the NYSC scheme. For good three weeks, a mini-Nigeria comes together at various orientation camps across the country to prepare to face the national task ahead. The NYSC is the largest formidable youth organisation that has in it a pool of trained intellectuals, which any country must have as human capital before it can successfully tread the path of economic growth and development. Thirdly, of all the khakis, the NYSC's is the only one for which an individual must obtain a minimum educational level of Bachelor's degree or its equivalent to wear. This necessary condition is only specifically peculiar to the national youth service scheme, unlike the military and paramilitary khakis that can be worn with post-primary certificates.

Of all the post-war corrective measures, only the NYSC scheme has stood the test of time and still fits contemporary Nigeria. It carries the spirit of national unity which is the bedrock of a stable nation. It is passionately driven by humility, selflessness and dedication. It makes one to be modest and have high opinions toward the importance of people's cultures and traditions. This way, one gets assimilated and integrated into at least one of the different and diverse socio-cultural settings of the country and this greatly enhances unity through integration. The scheme is universal and has a national outlook such that the teeming thousands of corps members drawn from various aspects of intellects and academic disciplines are deployed to virtually all the nooks and crannies of Nigeria to perform their respective national assignment. No government or non-governmental organisation is as far-reaching as the NYSC.

The scheme has given many participants the golden opportunity to know Nigeria, to appreciate its beautiful landscapes and understand its socio-cultural settings. If not because of the scheme, I cannot imagine myself crossing the Niger bridge to visit all the South-Eastern states and some parts of the South-South region of the country. We cruised through the jungles and paddled through the creeks. Coming from the far North-Eastern part of the country, Yobe State to be specific, my ten solid months' stay in a remote rural area of Isinwenke, Ihette/Uboma LGA of Imo State, unbelievably gave me a complete sense of belonging to the communities I was serving. I learnt the Igbo language within those months, and how to eat akpu, ukwa, okhazi, oha, achara and other delicacies. In fact, I can prepare some of them. I was also enchanted by the pronounced Mbemuozo, an initiation to manhood festival. To show how much they accepted me, they even offered me a beautiful girl (Kelechi) to marry!

I regard Imo State as my second home and also consider its people in particular and the entire Igbo ethnic group in general as my parents, guardians, brothers and sisters. They showed me love and care and my wellbeing was their utmost priority. I reminisce over a time when I was so sick as though I wasn't going to make it and my condition was further exacerbated when I took some fake drugs. A lady corps member from Delta State - Ndidi Amaka - took me to a private clinic for treatment. The doctor having realised who I was and where I was from treated me for a trifle amount. Ndidi went as far as Abia State to get me original drugs. The attention given to me was the type one receives from a loving family at home.

A corps member is always treated with dignity and respect by all, even outlaws. I remember an armed robbery incident which occurred along Enugu-Aba expressway of which everybody was either robbed or beaten except a colleague of mine whom they identify as a serving corps member. The robbers pitifully ordered him to remove his SIM card and surrender his phone to them for security reasons; after which they gave him the sum of five thousand naira from their loot to buy another one. Similarly, there have never been any reports of harassment or physical abuse on corps member even by the dreaded Niger Delta militia though known for their notoriety and callousness.

At the end of my stay in Imo State, on my way back to the North, I suffered a financial setback which resulted from a sudden hike in transport fare. I reached Onitsha with only three thousand naira while I needed about five thousand naira. It was a Friday and there was a problem of global network system for my bank. I felt truly stranded but as fate would have it, I met a woman whose son was posted to serve in Kano State and we got talking. She expressed serious fears for her son's life as she had heard many rumours of gruesome killings of Igbo people in the state. I told her I had been to Kano and assured her that her son would be safe. This put a smile on the woman's face and without knowing my travails, she gave me some money. Another person also gave me more...this was indeed a memorable experience for me.

My only regret, which will continue to linger on in my mind, is my inability to accomplish a legacy - my pet project on Basic Computer Skills to two selected secondary schools (Madonna Senior Science School and Okata Comprehensive Secondary School) of my serving community. The one-year mandatory service scheme as a whole is very challenging and interesting. The harshness and sweetness of it prepare one for the future challenges of life. It gives us a platform to taste the realities ahead and a hope for greater Nigeria.

However, one troubling question about the good gestures corps members receive from their host communities is: Are these good gestures extended to them because they are Nigerians from other parts of the country or is it simply because they are corps members?

Usman Geidam, NYSC/IM/07B/0454, from Imo State.

For me, palm tree is the flagship programme we have in Imo State. And we are embarking on what I called the bond nursery system. Because most of our nuts are already started yielding . We have 21 million outgrown palm trees in Imo State they had declined in their production yield so, we are now embarking on aggressive replantation policy.

I am so passionate about palm trees re-generation because of the potentials it has for alternative energy source. And ofcourse, the high income yielding capacity of palm trees. Also, the agronomy of palm tree favours Imo high and above any state in the federation.

Already, the Adamawa State government is seeking a collaborative venture with my state on how to develop palm trees in Adamawa State. Because this is the direction the world is moving. We can see what is happening to the price of crude oil.

If Imo State regains its position as number one oil producing state the economy would be stabilised, our people would be more employed. The high specie of seedling we are introducing is called tenera which starts yielding at 18 months and it bears the year round with minimum bunch of eight. If a man has 20 of these palm trees, he will live above the poverty line. For me, it is a very important programme that we must achieve. Because it eradicates poverty and strengthens the economy.

As we are approaching Christmas, I have held meetings with our rice growers association members, last year we mopped up some tons of rice from the association, this year we have increased our rice fields, we have trained about 1200 rice farmers in collaboration with USAID market. I am sure that we are going to have increased harvest.

We have concluded arrangement on a buy-back approach and sell them under the brand of new face rice of Imo which we did last year. And it was a fanstatic experience. And the Imo government is steadily embarking on aggressive agricultural revolution.

This administration of Governor Ohakim is making history in agriculture revolution just like our revered first premier of Eastern region, late Michael Okpara did. Governor Ohakim has done tremendously well in the area of release of funds for agriculture development and programmes. I want to confirm that another important programme that the governor started is the Achara Ugbo Graduate Youth scheme.

We deployed the graduates, give them land, do irrigation for them, built poultries, built pens for indigeneous conversion of our local cows. We also doing what they call multiplation of pigry. We give each of the graduates in the scheme a micro credit of five hundred thousand naira to start on their own and employ others. We are making them self reliant in agriculture.

At this time the world is experiencing acute food crisis what contribution can your success in agriculture make towards bailing Nigeria as a nation out of any food crisis as well as help its economic growth?

I thank you very much for this question. Last year we made history in agriculture and food production. This year we made history, we released our strategic green reserve. We mopped up our excess rice and immediately we received the global food scarcity signal, we released it on April 28. That cushioned the effect of the food crisis.

This year our governor provided fertilisers in good time and we are hopeful of a big boom in our harvests. Already, we are getting some of our harvests, we are sure this is going to guarantee food sufficiency, employment, save us from the impending global food crisis and contribute to our economic growth.

We are not resting on our oars. The staple food of our people is cassava. My target is to harvest ten million metric tons of cassava this year. We strategically planned it. Every member of the executive council of the state is mandated to own a hectare of cassava.

We ploughed and mechanised it for them. Every local government council was mandated to do five hectare of cassava. We have inplace cassava processing plant and we introduced high specie of cassava stem. This is giving me satisfaction. If we can sustain what we had started we have food in abundance and enough to sell to other states in the federation.

Do you have any preservation facility or would allow the expected boom to waste?

I can tell you here that we have approval to build 100,000 metric tonnes of silos in Imo State. The federal government gave the approval recently, because they know that we are expecting a huge harvest this year. If we don't have the facility to store our excess food they would perish. So the federal government is working with Imo State government to avoid this situation.

The federal government has adjudged Imo State the food basket of Nigeria and has allocated funds for the silos which runs into billions of naira to build it. I can't wait to see its realisation.

Do you have plans for export?

Our governor is futuristic. He plans ahead. We know how food export could boost revenue generation, so we are not losing focus on food export in future. Look at our fish production. The governor said I should have achieved a 30 per cent increase in fish production by the end of this year, as at this month (November ) I have surpassed the target by 68 per cent. If you visit many homes in the state you will see the Ohakim home fish scheme. If you are in my house I will give you fish to eat as in cola. We have enough fish production in Imo State.

While waiting for the Silos to store excess foods, in the maintime what is in place to take care of the bumper harvest to avoid them being perished?

Thank you. The federal government has introduced the GMP - Guarantee Minimum Price Policy. Every state has three licensed buyers on behalf of federal government. So whatever that is produced in excess these licensed buyers would buy it. We have built garri processing plants in all the local government areas in the state. On the World Food Day, we fed prisoners in the state and sent food to motherless babies homes. I am not saying something that is not empirical.

How much has the state government spent on this projects so far?

It depends on the particular project. For instance, the budget for the graduate youth scheme, we have estimated N38 million, that is what the governor has approved. We are applying prudence and accountability as a guide.

For rice production, last year he released N15 million and we mopped up about 5,000 bags of rice which we sold, with the proceeds of last year we don't need to ask for money anymore. For cassava, the governor directed a collaborative venture with the local government councils and they are funding it with N3.2 million per five hectare to produce. We are not just doing business as usual.

Now, those you granted the N500,000 loan in the graduate farmers scheme what are the repayment conditions?The system works like this, we have screened and conducted interviews for the young graduates.