By Arc Kabir Ibrahim
Today Nigeria is poised to attain food sufficiency and general prosperity by scaling Agricultural productivity while investing appropriately in so many competencies where there are obvious comparative advantages.
In order to seamlessly and sustainably attain food security, however, there is every need to promote collaboration and partnerships among all stakeholders such as farmers, State and LGAs as well as MDAs and AgriBusiness with cross-cutting responsibilities in the Agriculture space.
The desired synergy between the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security and the Ministry of Water Resources and Sanitation, for instance, becomes absolutely necessary in order to do Agricultural production all-year-round efficiently so also will be collaborations between the Ministries of Power, Trade and Investment, Environment, Humanitarian Affairs, Science and Technology, Finance etc. in our quest for the attainment of sustainable food security.
The declaration of the state of emergency on food security by Mr President will be more effective if it’s predicated on the promotion of partnerships and collaboration between all institutions and stakeholders in the Agricultural sector especially those with 29th November, 2023 proven relevance to Agricultural production, processing, distribution, marketing and even consumption because these are the pillars of a veritable food system.
It is poignant to note that the recent outings of the Ministers of Agriculture in the Annual National Agricultural Show, the flag off of dry season farming on wheat in Hadejia, Jigawa State, the Africa Seed Connect and Good morning Nigeria etc. go to show their commitment to the work at hand.
In order to bolster Agricultural productivity there is also every need to incentivize the SHFs (small Holder Farmers)to be able to work assiduously by ensuring that they obtain all inputs including access to light mechanization at affordable prices, in good time and that all interventions are closely monitored and periodically evaluated with the farmer-leaders included in the teams.
It is also prudent as well as highly desirable for Mr President or his Vice to attend “round-tables” occasionally with the farmers and all stakeholders in the Agriculture Space in order to incentivize them further.
The Insecurity pervading some areas of Agricultural production in
Nigeria must be addressed finally and definitely for the attainment of sustainable food security in the entire nation, too!
Arc. Kabir Ibrahim FNIA,
National President, All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN),
Chairman BOT, NAFN (National Agricultural Foundation of Nigeria).