Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

By Bilyamin Abdulmumin 

Last Tuesday, the Federal Executive Council approved several development projects. One of these projects is Malando-Wara-Ngaski Road in Kebbi State. Ngaski Local Government hosts GB Foods Africa, Africa’s largest integrated tomato paste processing facility.

Earlier this year, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, represented by Minister of Agriculture Senator Abubakar Kyari, inaugurated the 2,400-tonne GB Foods tomato farm and concentrate factory. The project employed about 2,000 people, and another 5,000 outgrowers were trained and engaged. This is the height of impact that the industry can achieve in a state. 

This project was started during the second term of the industrious visionary leader, the current minister of budget and national planning. The project is now sealed with the firm support of the president and his successor, Dr Nasir Idris. 

The success of this project has gone a long way, vindicating one of my articles. When the Nigerians voted for Tinubu in the last general presidential election, I pointed to the imperative of voting for Dr Nasir Idris to succeed Senator Atiku Bagudu in Kebbi State. Imagine if the opposition party had secured the leadership of Kebbi State; it would have been much more difficult for both leaders to cooperate and much more challenging for the president to champion the project. Political scheming can never be overruled, even in developmental projects.

Another equally significant project undertaken by the former Kebbi State governor is the bioethanol plant. The project is also located in the Kebbi South, Danko/Wasagu local government; the project is even said to be more ambitious than the GB Food, as about 47,000 hectares of cassava are needed to supply the plant. If GB Food needs farmland of only about 1500 hectares to secure 7000 jobs, now do the math to figure out how many jobs the plant that, at full capacity, will require output of 47,000 hectares can create.  

During one of my seminar presentations, a professor decried the government’s lack of commitment to the B10 policy (a policy that envisaged the use of 10 per cent ethanol in petrol). Having the privilege of insider information, as one of the team of my supervisors is a consultant to the policy, I eased the Prof worry, explaining that the policy in Kebbi State is receiving a green light. The pilot plant has already been test run, about 5000 hectares of cassava have been cultivated, and the consultant’s hands are on the desk fishing out final torches of feasibility studies.

The rice revolution was the first industrialisation to be bagged through the Bagudu vision. The minister’s interest in industrialisation coincided with the then federal government’s interest in agriculture, so the appointment of Bagudu as chairman of the presidential task force on rice and wheat production proved to be a success story. Thanks to the mega to small-scale rice processing plants in the state, Kebbi has since become synonymous with rice production in Nigeria. One factor that points to the success of the rice revolution is the improvement of IGR in Kebbi State, which accrued from rice processing activities. When Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a successful business magnate who appeared to identify with competence, saw this uncommon performance, he could not help but delegate the responsibility of the Ministry of Budget and National Planning to the ace economist.

Industrialisation was a fit for purpose and value for money in Kebbi State, as farming was the bedrock economic activity of the state. All these industries rely on the farmers’ output to process their products. GB food processes tomatoes, bioethanol plants use cassava and sugarcane as raw materials, and rice processing plants need paddy rice.   

Nevertheless, dear Minister, while the success of the GB Foods tomato and rice industries can never be overemphasised, similar achievements need to be replicated in the bioethanol sector (the pace of bioethanol development seems to progress slowly), ensuring your continued vision of diversification of Kebbi’s industrial base.

 By Zayyad I. Muhammad

On October 17, 2022, at Arewa House, Bola Ahmed Tinubu presented to the north his blueprint for the region. He said he would fight bandits and terrorists with the technology the Buhari administration began to use in 2022. Tinubu pledged to turn the North’s fertile land into grain fields- the North would become the agriculture hub. The dairy economy and agro-allied industries would be promoted as he accelerates the Mambila Project and rejuvenates existing power stations. He vowed to exploit the gold in Zamfara and iron ore in Kogi State. Tinubu also promised to bring millions of North’s out-of-school children back to school through incentives. He further pledged to create a special commission for Almajiri education, including employing Almajiri teachers.

So far, President Tinubu has appointed eight (8) Special Advisers (SAs), appointments seen by many political pundits as the direction of his administration’s policies and programs. Of the portfolios of the eight SAs, agriculture gets none.  Has Tinubu forgotten agriculture, or has he major policies and programs planned for the sector?

The North needs a unique recovery program in the agriculture sector- the mainstay of the region’s economy is now devastated by banditry, insecurity, floods, and corruption. Some of the previous administrations’ beautifully designed programs for agriculture have been abused.  Many ‘real’ farmers have tearfully complained that the custodians of the programs and projects have hijacked the benefits.

The Anchor Borrowers Programme, Presidential Fertilizer Initiative (PFI), Youth Farm Lab, Paddy Aggregation Scheme, Agricultural Trust Fund, Presidential Economic Diversification Initiative (PEDI), Food Security Council, etc., including other CBN interventions programs, are good. However, the implementation and targeting were not 100 per cent successful. For example, under the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative (PFI), fertiliser blenders benefit from government resources and smile to the banks, while the farmers for whom the scheme was primarily designed to buy fertilisers through their noses.   Instead of the 5,000 Naira per bag, as envisaged by the programme, a bag of fertiliser now costs between 20,000 to 25,000 Naira.

Despite the shortcomings of some of the programs,  Nigerian agricultural production has improved. For instance,  rice milling created many productive jobs.  The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said the Anchor Borrower Programme (ABP) supported about 4.57 million smallholder farmers who cultivated over 6.02 million hectares of 21 agro-commodities nationwide. The programme has helped to improve the national average yield per hectare of these commodities, with productivity per hectare almost doubling within eight years of the programme’s implementation.

Also, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) statistics indicated that some of these programmes contributed significantly to the increased national output of commodities, with maize and rice peaking at 12.2 and 9.0 million metric tons in 2021 and 2022.

However, one of the fundamental bottlenecks that these projects and programs faced was their managers. For instance, the last two Ministers of Agriculture were somehow ‘disconnected’ from agriculture. Moreover, some programs and project managers are not agro-enthusiasts or farmer-friendly.

With workable and real farmer-friendly agricultural policies, programmes, and projects, President Tinubu will have a golden opportunity to directly ‘talk’ to millions of northerners. What should Tinubu do?- First, his Minister of Agriculture should be an agricultural enthusiast and an agile practising farmer who understands the entire agricultural value chain, politics, and markets.  A personality who understands the needs and global trends in agriculture and has a connection with real farmers and private initiatives. Tinubu’s agriculture minister should see agriculture from the prisms of entrepreneurship, wealth creation, and national GDP growth. Tinubu should also appoint a  Special Adviser on agriculture and an agricultural advisory team, which should be populated by competent real farmers. The Forum for Agricultural Commodities Association Chairman, Sadiq Darewa, once said: The Tinubu administration should sustain and improve upon programs and projects that have clear benefits for Nigerians. At the same time, those that have wasted Nigerians’ time should be rejected.

Tinubu may wish to sustain but redesign all the current agricultural policies, programs, and projects.  He needs to remove the apparent opacity which characterises most of the programs.

Tinubu should bring real farmer associations and groups on board to assist the government in redesigning the programs. They have a good grasp of what went wrong with the schemes, programmes, and projects and how to rejuvenate them for millions of real farmers in the country.

The redesigned and improved programmes should incorporate livestock production and the establishment of more herbicide and pesticide factories. Nigeria has no business spending billions of naira on importing water mixed with some chemicals; it should work on reducing the cost of seeds, fertilisers, and other inputs, including labour and transportation costs.

 Zayyad I. Muhammad writes from Abuja and can be contacted via zaymohd@yahoo.com.

By Amina Rabi’u Bako

Coconut is one of the most important and useful plants in the world. Apart from consuming the fruit and its water, many industries, such as pharmaceuticals, beverages and cosmetics, use its parts. As a rich fruit, it is encompassed with several opportunities that bring wealth to a nation. Everything about it is beneficial to man; it has economic, medicinal and nutritional value.

According to various global research findings, its uses can be seen from its components, ranging from the meat, oil, shell, coir, husk, water and lots more, making it more of a revenue economy booster. 

Coconut is nicknamed a tree of life. Nigeria established its first coconut plantation in 1876 in Badagry, Lagos State. The crop grows in over 30 of Nigeria’s 36 states, with Lagos and Akwa Ibom states having the largest production area.

With 83 per cent of Nigeria’s states into the production of coconut, the country should succeed in producing and exporting the product across the world. Unfortunately, however, according to the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), Nigeria ranks 19th in the production of coconut globally, placing the country far behind Indonesia, the Philippines and India.

As reported by Premium Times, the data obtained from the United Nations Office shows that Nigeria spent $219446.53 and $293214.22 on coconut importation in 2019 and 2018, respectively, an amount higher than $186094.58 spent on coconut importation in 2017.

The price of coconut in Nigeria today has risen by almost 100 per cent. This is not unconnected with over-reliance on coconut importation.

A coconut seller, Dahiru Umar, said, “The price keeps rising day by day. A single coconut has now multiplied its price compared to last year.”

Halima Abbas said, “the rise of coconut made me pause my coconut macaroons business for a while to see if the price might go down.”

National Coconut Producers, Processors and Marketers Association of Nigeria (NACOPPMAN) is moving towards making sufficient coconut trees in every corner of Nigeria’s states. During the flag-off and election of NACOPPMAN held in Kano, the Chairman, Fatima Abubakar, in her speech, said, “We cannot continue to import what we can produce locally! Coconut sufficiency in Nigeria is a reality.”

We need to do much better than we are doing. For, among other reasons, coconut has several health benefits. The reader may visit the Healthline.com website to see some of the benefits, which space will not allow me to describe here.

Nigeria should not afford to be left behind in the production of coconut. With the NACOPPMAN, the country can realise its dream of actualising coconut sufficiency, thereby utilising its health benefits and leveraging its economic value. Moreover, it is pertinent for the government to provide an enabling environment to attract foreign investors to come into the business. The earlier we wake up, the better.

Amina Rabi’u Bako is of the Faculty of Communication, Bayero University, Kano.

By Abdullahi Adamu

Nigeria’s economy has not been in good shape for the past five years and first went into recession in 2016. Then, in 2020, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, it plunged into another recession – its worst in four decades. As a result, it recorded a gross domestic product contraction of 3.62 per cent in the third quarter of 2020.

There’s been a lot of uncertainty about where people should invest, mainly due to policy inconsistencies. This cut across various economic sectors. The poor performance of different sectors of the economy, especially the agricultural sector, has created uncertainty and unemployment. In addition, the recurring farmer-herder crisis has hurt agriculture in the country.

However, can agriculture be used to reduce the high rate of poverty and unemployment in Nigeria? Absolutely! Agriculture has the potential to reduce the high rate of poverty and unemployment in the country by employing millions of Nigerians across the agriculture value chain.

Take cassava processing as an example. Nigeria is the largest cassava producer in the world. There is much to gain from knowing the value chain of cassava, starting from production to processing and then marketing. Cassava, just like yam, is a root and tuber crop.

However, unlike yam, it can grow in relatively poor soil and low rainfall areas. Cassava and its by-products have various uses. It can be processed into starch: the cassava starch used for making paper and textiles. It can be processed into flour to make cakes, bread and biscuits. It can be processed into chips usable for animal feed. It can be processed into ethanol, which is used as bio-fuel when combined with additives. Cassava is also processed into fructose, used in the industry for sweetening fizzy drinks.

In Nigeria, we produce over 50 million tons of cassava every year, and over 26 states out of the 36 states in Nigeria produce the crop. Therefore, if we embrace good agricultural practices, the production, processing, and marketing of cassava can serve as a good tool to reduce the country’s high rate of poverty and unemployment.

It is also important to note that the most considerable portion of the population of Nigeria is the youth. The percentage of youth (age 15 – 35) among the unemployed population is 55.4 per cent. So, with increased youth involvement in agriculture, the sector can reduce youth unemployment.

Agriculture is the easiest and fastest route to empower the most vulnerable, especially the youth. However, it also needs improvement in the micro and macroeconomics of the country.

It is imperative to turn around the economic fortunes of Nigeria through the agricultural revolution, especially in the face of dwindling revenue to the governments due to the global financial crisis aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The country needs to sustain the present agricultural revolution tempo and bring about social engineering that will inspire more young people and women to engage in mechanised farming.

Abdullahi Adamu wrote via nasabooyoyo@gmail.com.

By Mukhtar Ya’u Madobi

The right to sufficient food is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and subsequent international law. Food security is regarded as a situation whereby all people at all times have physical, social and economic access to sufficient food to meet their dietary needs for a productive and healthy life.  Food security is ensured when food becomes available, affordable and accessible.

However, it is good to note that food security is not simply having sufficient quantities of various staple foodstuffs. It also entails access to the entire citizenry to these food items at affordable prices. It further means that we must not only engage in mass food production but also ensure that Nigeria has sufficient purchasing power to acquire food items that guarantee good feeding and nutrition.
Food security has to do with the absence of threats of hunger or malnutrition people face in their lives. In a broad sense, it entails safety from basic physiological needs. The lack of safety will be manifested in chronic hunger or starvation and malnutrition.

The majority of the rural populace depends on Agricultural related activities for their livelihood. The appraisal in the past showed that successive administrations in Nigeria had initiated programs towards ensuring food availability and accessibility for the teeming population in the country.

These include; the National Accelerated Food Production Program (NAFPP) by Gen. Yakubu Gowon, Operation Feed the Nation (OFN) by Murtala/Obasanjo Administration; River Basin and Rural Development Authority (RBRDA), Green Revolution and World Bank-funded Agricultural Development Project (ADP) by Shehu Shagari and Babangida’s Directorate for Food, Road and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI) among others.

Despite these efforts, Agriculture has been constrained by numerous challenges such as rural-urban migration, insufficient infrastructure, poor agricultural inputs, reliance on oil economy, over-dependence on rain-fed farming, environmental degradation, inadequate funding, poor socio-economic status of farmers, poor mechanization, climate change, corruption and poor commitment to the implementation of agricultural policies.

Yet, the most grievous bottleneck facing the agricultural sector today in Nigeria is the mass abandoning of arable land by farmers due to security challenges. These security threats include but are not limited to insurgency, banditry and kidnappings, killings and farmers-herders’ clashes. Consequently, all these turmoils lead to a deficit in agricultural production.

Nigeria still has the potentials to be food-secure through the adoption and implementation of strategic measures for the peasant farmers to operate in their farming activities through ensuring rural development, provision of easy access to basic farm inputs, adequate budgetary allocations to agriculture, particularly to the food crop sub-sector, enunciation of appropriate policies for food crop sub-sector, political stability, reduction in rural poverty, and peasant farmers’ education among others.

In response to that, the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has initiated multiple agricultural programs aimed at ensuring food security in the country. Notable among them include the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP) that commenced in 2015, which provides farm inputs both in kind and cash to smallholders farmers to boost the production of agricultural commodities. Tremendous success stories were achieved through this program, especially with breakthrough rice production in Kebbi State. The Presidential Fertilizer Initiative (PFI) was launched in 2016, a partnership between Nigeria and Morocco to make fertilizer available to the farmers. In addition, farm Youth Lab (FYL) is another Initiative of the Federal Agricultural Ministry to train Nigerian youths on livestock production and sustainable urban agriculture.

Additionally, the Presidential Economic Diversification Initiative (PEDI) was also launched in 2017 to support the revival of moribund industries, especially agro-processing ones, through facilitating investment, reducing regulatory bottlenecks, and enabling access to credit.

Moreover, in March 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari inaugurated the National Food Security Council (NFSC). The council was mandated to develop sustainable solutions to farmers and herders clashes, climate change, piracy and banditry, as well as desertification and their impacts on farmland, grazing areas, lakes and rivers. All these efforts are aimed towards increasing food production in the country.

The latest version of National Security Strategy 2019, a document released by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), Retired Major-General Babgana Monguno, noted that with the drastic reduction of food importation, the government would continue to develop agricultural potentials to attain self-sufficiency in food production as well as exportation. “The government will further consolidate investment in agricultural mechanization, irrigation and infrastructure to mitigate the risk and uncertainty occasioned by seasonal rainfall. In addition, modern techniques will be adopted to improve beef and dairy production and consolidate strategic food reserves to ensure that the nation is prepared for major emergencies and shortages”.

The latest Federal Government directives on the establishment of farm estates in 109 Senatorial districts across the nation deserves an accolade. This mandate is to be realized by the recently resuscitated National Agricultural Land Development Authority (NALDA), which has already commissioned its first integrated farm estate in Katsina and other states. Across the country, each farm is expected to engage in the rearing of poultry, fish and livestock, apiculture, crop farming, packaging and processing, respectively.

With this development, it is hopeful that the country will achieve food security and self-sufficiency in food production within the near future.

Nonetheless, even if all the policies mentioned above are implemented unless strategic measures are put in place to curtail the rising security challenges bedevilling the country, otherwise, the wish of the country to become a food-secure nation will never be realized.

Thus, peaceful environments should be created for farmers to resettle and muster more strength towards cultivating the vast abandoned arable lands in order to boost agricultural production in the country.

Mukhtar Ya’u Madobi writes from Kano. He can be contacted via ymukhtar944@gmail.com.

By Abdulrahman Yunusa

Perhaps, this current administration has come with the solid whims of making an agricultural revolution, but they failed to understand that it’s one of the most challenging plans to achieve. It’s most demanding because it’s beyond paperwork, lip service or even baseless table talk. Instead, it requires tireless effort and viable policies to realise.

Likewise, it’s really a sacrificial movement that needs to go beyond the border of border closure tactics. Modern farming techniques are required, well and learned agriculturists versatile in modern farming should be hired to do the job efficiently.

Contrary to the above, the government brought poor hands couple with the introduction of outdated personalities to do the job. It is a clear indicator that we are not ready to achieve our goals.

 I think all these failed tried politicians have been used by the father of mediocrity and ineptitude to prove how vast and expert this administration is when it comes to the game of political deceit. So can we keep channelling our traps into the wrong portion and be anticipating a rattling result? But, of course, things never work out in such a fraudulent way.

Imagine putting the wrong panel in a position and expecting it to work perfectly. Is this not a self-deceit at its truest form? If it happens to be true, then malfunction within their administrative circle would forever prevail since meritocracy has become a key factor to be sidelined by the change charlatans. As they move to change the seemingly poor narratives here, today, the incapacitated hands are making the job uglier than it was.

Therefore, as a country dancing in between the edge of capitalism, socialism and liberal economic system as a guiding economic instrument, they should promptly take off the fruitless idea of border closure and let food float into our country. Say this because for one to develop, he must underdevelop someone, and that could be made possible only when we have a shoulder to lean upon while trying to make the dream reality.

Also, technology should be the leading figure in this journey. All these outdated farming tactics and machines should be utterly dispelled and be substituted with modern ones.

On no reasonable ground, one will expect people to produce the enormous quantity of food that will suffice a big country like Nigeria and even have a surplus that could export to neighbouring countries using the 1908s farming system. Meanwhile, at the moment where they are battling with their stomach, and annoyingly the price of fertiliser and other farming equipment couple with chemicals are at a high price.

Most importantly, people need to be fed well before heading to the farming ground, where most of their energy is utilised. Failure to provide them food at an affordable price will drastically reduce the outcome of their farming during the harvesting season, yet the desired goals will never be achieved that way.

Our govt needs to work on its farming system mechanism to fill the existing gap in the realm of agriculture and food security. 

Abdulrahman Yunusa is a political and public affairs analyst. He writes from Bauchi and can be reached through abdulrahmanyunusa@gmail.com.

By Sumayyah Auwal Ishaq

The erstwhile Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Alhaji Sabo Nanono, on Thursday handed over to the new Minister, Dr. Mohammad Mahmood Abubkar in a brief ceremony at the ministry’s headquarters in Abuja.

In his speech, Nanono thanked President Muhammadu Buhari for the opportunity given to him to serve the country. He also thanked the entire staff for the cordial relationship and teamwork they have had. During his remarks, Dr. Mahmood commended President Buhari for the confidence bestowed in him. He also saluted the outgoing minister for the achievements.

The Minister reiterated his commitments towards the actualization of President Buhari’s policies for the economic development of Nigeria.