In his inaugural speech, President Muhammadu Buhari said agriculture would be a priority. Too often, theoreticians and government-types discuss agriculture in developmental terms, rather than as practical business. They abdicate the right perspectives when formulating policies for food security, import substitution, export of cash crops, producing raw materials for the agro-allied industry, and creating jobs.
Before the recession, Nigeria’s economy, the biggest in Africa, was also one of the fastest growing in Africa. But traditional macroeconomic growth indices, like the Gross Domestic Product and per capita income, did not reflect in the lives of the people:
It didn’t increase jobs, but rather accentuated inequalities among citizens, and between urban and rural Nigeria.
The oil sector that drives the economic growth is more of an upstream business, and is disconnected from the rest of the local economy. Actors in the oil business are visibly different in opulence and lifestyle from their contemporaries.
And the revenue derived from oil is used to finance the importation of consumables that create jobs for other economies. This may have informed The Economist’s 2005 expression of doubt that Nigeria’s growth could be sustained.
If agriculture is not providing jobs as expected, the fault lies in inadequate financing, infrastructure deficit, antiquated technology, low literacy, and the connivance between politicians and importers who compromise the growth of the domestic economy with inconsistent policies. Above all, no one treats agriculture as a business.
With the right policies, agriculture should offer a way out of the tripartite scourge of youth unemployment, food insecurity, and women disempowerment. Agricultural policies must be decidedly inclusive, to sweep more Nigerians into the economic net. Nigerians should be able to have flourishing livelihoods and careers in agriculture.
India recently came to explore the possibility for Nigeria to produce palsy or peas, an Indian staple food. Saudi Arabia is contemplating buying ram from Nigeria, which, incidentally, is also the world’s greatest producer of sorghum, yam, cassava, cowpeas, and onions.
Those who should know, report that Egyptian cotton that commands premium price in the international commodities market, like those of Russia and China, was developed from cotton seedlings from northern Nigeria.
It’s a shame that despite the enormous potential that comes with about 230 billion cubic litres reserve of water, Nigeria cultivates less than half of its 68 million hectares of arable land, and imports nearly $22 million worth of food items like rice, fish, and vegetable oil from other economies.
Worse is that 43 per cent of these imported goods are consumed by only 10 per cent parasitic Nigerians. While some complain that some Nigerian farm produce, like cotton, cassava, and rice, are being exported, others counter that Nigeria’s importation of food items is going down. Well, the shelf space occupied by imported processed food items puts a lie to the latter assumption.
The Federal Executive Council’s recent fire brigade inter-ministerial task force, set up to ensure a steady flow of food into the market, and reverse increases in food prices, tells of a deliberate act to compel Adam Smith’s invisible hand to force an equilibrium between the demand and supply of food items.
But really, if local farm produce is exported rather than being sold locally, it must be that the local market cannot match the price that is paid by the international market, or the local processing capacity cannot effectively absorb the quantity produced, even if quantity produced is considered insufficient.
If conducive environment is lacking for Nigerian consumers to buy locally produced food items, and for local industry to buy, efficiently process, and market local farm produce, no one should be surprised if the produce are diverted to external trade. As the aphorism goes, economic goods follow the money.
You see, if Nigeria were to avoid what economists describe as a “dear money” economy, where relatively small quantity of money (resulting from poor macroeconomic policies and a high interest rate introduced by an insensitive Central Bank of Nigeria) is running after relatively high quantity of goods, farmers cannot be blamed for seeking higher profit abroad.
At the risk of stating the obvious, Nigeria will achieve increased agricultural output only by enhancing the quality and inventory of infrastructure, like power, roads, railway line, cargo airports, and silos; provide enough water for irrigation; and use the media and extension agents to popularise agricultural research findings.
Agro-allied industrialists that can efficiently add value to local farm produce must be encouraged to take advantage of domestic and international markets. John D. Rockefeller had proved that there is more money to be made in adding value to a primary produce before it is sold.
There must be a holistic, systematic, and sequential value chain approach for long term planning, but short- and medium-term execution. In other words, Nigeria’s agricultural policy must be conceived in long-terms, but executed as interconnected and incremental modules of interconnected tasks. Agriculture must be made attractive by improving rural amenities and infrastructure.
The hydra-headed corruption monster that converts unpatriotic politicians into profiteering fertiliser and seedlings middlemen, and encourages farmers to divert bank loans into activities other than farming, must be slayed with swift, appropriate and adequate sanctions. Sabotage against agriculture may have to be regarded as an economic sabotage.
Security on the farmstead is becoming a major issue. Some Northern Nigerian farmers no longer go to their farms because of the risk of kidnapping. In 2016, a former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Olu Falae, was abducted, after his farm was vandalised by some Fulani herdsmen. You get no prize for guessing correctly that the Boko Haram insurgency has compromised farming in northeast Nigeria.
The national budget, a veritable vehicle for articulate enunciation of government policies, must conform to the Maputo Declaration that recommends devotion of 10 per cent of annual budgets of African nations to agriculture.
Nigeria’s projected population of 279 million by 2050 provides a feeding and employment challenge, as well as a business opportunity. Government must promote the aspect of the processing value chain that can steadily ensure availability of food, raw materials, and high profit yield, and sustain long-term careers.
This is another way of saying that you must enhance the processing aspect of farming, to command higher prices from the domestic and international markets. Enough of the sob story about “whitey” exporting Nigeria’s cheap cocoa beans to Europe, and returning the same as expensive processed chocolate.
To effectively play in the international processed food market, government must speedily correct what caused the European Union’s Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed to ban 67 Nigerian food items because of poor quality, contamination, and high chemical levels. Nigeria can make use of the hard currency accruable from a vibrant export trade in processed food.
Those who plan Nigeria’s agri-business must decide if the market will extend beyond the country, and act accordingly. Nigeria’s porous border is an acknowledgment that there is a robust export trade for raw and processed farm produce, and Nigeria must take full advantage of that.
Donor agencies, like the Ford Foundation that funds Ibadan’s International Institute for Tropical Agriculture, and the United States Agency for International Development that is offering to train about 400,000 smallholder farmers and small-scale agro-allied processors in new farm techniques, accessing funding, and acquiring marketing skills, should be welcomed with both hands. Help is never too much.
- Lekan Sote
Twitter @lekansote1
No comments:
Post a Comment