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Sunday April 6, 2014 | 55
BUSINESSAGRO FG’s Rice Policy Has Done Well, Says Agric Minister By Fabian Odum HE Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina says Federal Government’s policy on rice, a core strategy under the Agricultural Transformation Agenda (ATA) has succeeded beyond all expectations and that the proposed tariff regime on the commodity is needed to protect local investors in rice, including farmers and millers, as well as create jobs and wealth for Nigerians, according to FMARD release. The Minister made the assertion recently during his presentation at the National Assembly public hearing on rice policy. Adesina posited that Nigeria had the capacity to become not only self-sufficient, but a net exporter of rice and that the Federal Government and forward looking stakeholders in the rice sector are determined to reduce the ridiculously high foreign exchange of over N365 billion being spent annually on rice import. According to the Minister, it made no sense at all that Nigeria, with an arable land area of 84 million of arable land, is the second largest importer of rice in the world. The country, he said, definitely can grow rice and end the decades of dependence on rice imports from India and Thailand, as they don’t have anything that we do not have to produce rice. He said it is time we realized that the more Nigeria imported food items that can be grown locally, the less local production and the high level of unemployment and the worse our national insecurity. That, Adesina said, is why President Jonathan’s government is driving a major import substitution drive on rice and other commodities under the Agricultural Transformation Agenda. He said Nigerians needed to frown upon the heavy flow of import of low quality and sometimes very unsafe foods, including rice and fish, wondering why some citizens are vigorously campaigning and taking sides with importers, wondering why we must import what we can produce, a situation he called “prodigal economics.” According to Adesina, international trade experts say the only option for Thailand and India to get rid of their excess rice stockpile of 18 and 14 million metric tonnes respectively is to dump it on foreign markets at a loss. Thailand, he said, subsidized its farmers paying them 200 per cent price above the market price, costing the Thai government $15 billion this year. If allowed to happen, rice import has a potential of scuttling the bold drive of the government to make Nigeria self-sufficient in rice. The rice importers, Adesina argued, simply want to take advantage of huge profits they would make from the cheap rice imports to harp on the need to lower rice tariffs.
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Cassava-Wheat composite flour bread on display at the forum… law on inclusion will ensure sustainability, create jobs
Cassava Bread: Hope Alive, New Bill For National Assembly By Fabian Odum HE Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr. Adewumi Adesina has said there is need for sustainability of the High Quality Cassava Flour (HQCF) inclusion in bread therefore, stakeholders have to work together to ensure the passage of the Cassava Bread bill into law. Conveying this intention to participants at the one-day stakeholders forum on the draft Cassava Flour bill, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Mrs. Ibukun Odusote, representing the Agriculture minister said it has become necessary due to insinuations that it had abandoned the cassava bread project.
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In spite of the hitches, twists and turns over the past months, there is silver lining in the sky for the cassava value chain, and sorghum, too, by this move of the ministry. Mrs. Odusote revealed a number of small and large bakers are already adopting the use of cassava/wheat composite flour. Stakeholders met in Abuja on Thursday, not only to get updates on the state of the N10bn Cassava Development Fund but also to finetune the Draft Bill on Cassava Inclusion in bread for onward transmission to the National Assembly for due consideration and passage to law. The Permanent secretary said President
Ogun To Launch Private-Sector Owned Cassava Farm HE agricultural transformation policy of the T Ogun State government will get a major boost next week when the state governor, Ibikunle Amosun launches a 10-hectare cassava pilot farm promoted by Caterina de’ Medici Africa Projects Ltd (CDMA) at at Ikenne, Ikenne local government of the state on April 9. The pilot farm, which will serve as a prelude to a bigger 4,000 hectare cassava farm to be supported by Thai Farms International Ltd and other investors, is buoyed up by the USAID- Nigeria Expanded Trade and Transport Program (NEXTT) and several local banks. Foluke Michael, Principal Partner of CDMA said
the project will adopt modern farming methods, conduct training for local farmers, supply the farmers with agro-chemical to improve farm yield, and provide other extension services to all its partners. “The partnership with the State will also help to build public infrastructure changes in agricultural policy,” she said. The Ogun State government is supporting the programme with a total of 4,000 hectares of land, which it has allocated to CDMA, in the belief that the large population of smallholder farmers and entrepreneurs in the state will benefit directly from the programme.
Jonathan approved N10bn Cassava Bread Fund and put an Oversight Committee on the initiative to ensure transparency in the administration of the fund. The committee members, according to Mrs. Odusote, are drawn from such organisations as Nigerian Cassava Growers Association (NCGA), National Cassava Processors and Marketers Association (NCAPMA), National Association of Mater Bakers and Confectioners of Nigeria, NAFDAC, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Bank of Agriculture, Bank of Industry (BoI), FIIRO, National Institute of Food Science and Technology, FMARD among a few others. It would be observed that the Bank of Agriculture would oversee the primary production in which small-scale farmers would be supported to cultivate 29,500ha of cassava for production of 590,000 metric tonnes of tubers for HQCF. Towards this, she said a list of farmers cultivating between 24 ha each is being compiled by the NCGA to ensure sustainable supply of roots to SMEs. For BoI, the equipment support to the Master bakers and SMEs is its domain. It will ensure low interest loans for their working capital. For now, according to the Permanent Secretary, letters of offer are currently being distributed to beneficiaries. For now, it expected that the actualisation of 20 per cent cassava flour inclusion in wheat for bread would save about N127Bn and create 1.3 million jobs in the sector. Meanwhile, the draft bill is yet to be completed and the time of submission to the National Assembly committees on Agriculture is yet to be determined, according to a member of the legal committee at the technical session during the forum.
GES: Ogun Urges Farmers To Register Now in Ogun State, FforARMERS who have not registered Growth Enhancement Support (GES) Scheme of the Federal Government, have been asked to do so now to benefit from the package. In flagging off the 2014 edition of the scheme at the Eweje Farm Institute in Odeda Local Government Area of the State, State Agriculture Commissioner, Mrs. Ronke Sokefun said farmers can have access to inputs such as seedlings and fertilizer at subsidised rates. She added that the federal government driven scheme was capable of enhancing farmers’ productivity, income and quality of life. Mrs. Sokefun urged registered farmers, who had benefited from the scheme in the past but had not done the needful to do so immediately as maize and rice would be priority crops this season. “ This year’s commodity roll-
out will be executed concurrently by starting with the generic, which involves maize or rice seed with fertilizer within a period of sixeight weeks while other commodity roll-out will last for two weeks each in a quick succession,” she said. State Director for the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Muyiwa Akinsola recalled the GES scheme was introduced in 2011 to transform small-scale farmers from subsistence farming to commercial agriculture. Akinsola noted that there was provision for both small and large-scale farmers to improve on their practices so as to increase agricultural produce in the country. President, Ogun State chapter, All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Mr. Segun Dasaolu thanked both the Federal and State Governments for the sub-