At least 74 dairy farmers in Plateau State have accused Integrated Dairies Limited (IDL), producers of Farm Fresh products, of cloning their bank accounts and diverting funds from the Federal Government’s N441.8 million dairy intervention project.
The farmers, under the Wunato Dairy Farmers and Multipurpose Cooperative Society, raised the alarm during a press conference held at Vwang Town Hall in Jos South Local Government Area.
Spokesperson of the cooperative, Mr. Bulus Davou, said the Agric-Business, Small and Medium Enterprise Investment Scheme (AGSMEIS) loan meant to empower farmers was instead hijacked by IDL, leaving them indebted and in disarray.
“In April 2021, Integrated Dairies Limited convened a stakeholders’ meeting in Vwang where the project was presented as a partnership with the Central Bank of Nigeria.
“We were told that pens would be built, cows supplied, and that IDL would buy our milk to repay the loan. It was explained as corporate social responsibility, but we later discovered it was a Federal Government intervention project,” Davou said.
He explained that more than 500 persons applied for the scheme, but only 74 farmers were selected for the pilot phase.
According to him, the farmers were asked to open accounts with NIRSAL Microfinance Bank in Jos, only to later discover that cloned accounts had been secretly created with their details.
“These accounts were credited with N5.97 million each, but we never had access to the money. On August 17, 2022, N5.58 million was transferred from each cloned account directly into IDL’s account, amounting to N413.2 million.
We were left with just N16,000 each, while IDL assumed control of the project,” he said.
The farmers alleged further that IDL inserted one of its staff as a signatory to their cooperative account, compelled them to sign documents without legal guidance, and subsequently facilitated withdrawals from their personal bank accounts through the Global Standing Instruction (GSI), even though loan repayment was supposed to come from milk sales.
“This has thrown us into trauma and indebtedness. The cows were only delivered to us in February 2024, two years after the money was released. Because of this delay, milk production was stalled, yet deductions were still made from our accounts,” Davou lamented.
He added that the cooperative had been forced to survive constant crises since the project began.
“From 2021 till now, 70 to 80 per cent of our time has been spent managing crises — shortage of feed, poor construction, fraudulent financial practices, and lack of transparency from IDL. All these have made us see the project as a scam,” he stated.
The farmers also accused their facilitator of tampering with personal savings accounts unrelated to the project, worsening their hardship. They said the withdrawals crumbled their livelihoods, leaving many of them indebted.
Efforts to get a response from Integrated Dairies Limited were unsuccessful. The company’s management declined to speak on record or allow its staff to be photographed while countering the allegations.
