Minister of agriculture
Change of currency note of great disadvantage to farmers. The Federal Government declared on Monday that the Central Bank of Nigeria’s naira redesign strategy, which ran from December 15, 2022, to early February this year, when the Supreme Court ruled against it, bankrupted farmers.
In a similar lament, federal lawmakers declared that the country’s rate of hunger and famine is killing the poor in rural areas.
During the National Assembly Joint Committee on Agriculture’s budget defense session, Senator Abubakar Kyari, Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, lamented the impact of the disputed currency re-design and hunger caused by insecurity.
The minister stated in his presentation before the joint committee chaired by Senator Saliu Mustapha (APC Kwara Central) that the goal of the sector’s 2024 budgetary proposals is to attain food security in the country.
Several reasons, including insecurity and the naira re-design strategy implemented around a year ago, he claims, have impoverished farmers and badly undermined food security in the country.
“Because of the cash crunch caused by the re-design of the naira, most farmers sold their farm produce at giveaway prices to survive because buyers couldn’t access cash to buy the produce from them.”
“The policy which coincided with harvest season, ended rendering the farmers empty financially,” he pointed out.
Separately at the session, Dahiru Haruna from Toro Federal Constituency in Bauchi State and Ademorin Kuye from Shomolu Federal Constituency in Lagos State raised the alarm about the Federal Government’s urgent need to address the country’s high rate of hunger, which is largely caused by insecurity.
“Minister, being from the North East, the picture I am about to paint should not be strange to you at all,” Haruna stated in his speech.
“A pathetic picture of people dying of hunger every day, while the majority of those who survive only eat once a day.”
“Making it worrisome is the fact that even people from neighbouring countries like Chad, Niger, Benin Republic and Central Aftrica, are trooping in to mop up the little food, signalling total famine in the area if not urgently addressed by stockpiling the silos “.
But Ademorin, in his remarks, wrote off the silos by putting it to the minister that most of the silos built by President Jonathan’s administration are alleged to be concessions for N20 million each.
The minister, however, in his response, assured the lawmakers that all issues raised would be decisively addressed in the 2024 fiscal year.
Kyari said food security is the number one out of the 8- 8-point agenda of President Bola Tinubu’s administration and that the ministry has repositioned itself for actualisation of the agenda.
Apart from protecting farmlands, he claims that some of the action plans already in place to maintain food security in the country include “certification of available planting materials for some food security crops in readiness for dry season farming.”
“Reviewing the mechanisms and processes for delivering fertilizers and agro-pesticides to farmers in a transparent and accountable manner.”
“Fast-track the National Agricultural Development Fund’s takeoff and operations.”
“Implement a joint action plan with the Federal Ministry of Water Resources to unlock the huge irrigation potentials of the River Basin Development Authorities and other flood plains in the country to guarantee all-year-round food production etc.”
Earlier in his statement, he told committee members that for the fiscal year 2024, a total of N362.940 billion was set aside for the sector, with the Ministry receiving N124.1 billion.
According to him, the N124.1 billion is divided as follows: N10.6 billion for human costs, N1.34 billion for overhead, and N112.497 billion for capital expenditure.