In the wake of a severe heatwave, popular Nigerian television host Ebuka Obi-Uchendu laments on Twitter that the brand of eggs he eats is missing from grocery shelves. On further inquiry, he is told that the suppliers of those eggs lost 5,000 of their chickens to sweltering weather - a problem that is a source of complaint among many Nigerians today.
The World Meteorological Organization predicts that 2019 will be among the globe's hottest years on record. And Nigerian farmers - such as the poultry producers who provide Obi-Uchendu's eggs - are among those feeling the heat.
In Zaria in northern Nigeria, where recent temperatures have spiked to 36C, farmer Olusola John says the severe heat has been affecting his 600 chickens. "I lost some of my birds to it," he sighs. "My colleague sold off her birds because she couldn't cope with the stress."
John dreams of building a modern-style chicken house that could minimise his heat-related losses. But such a structure could cost as much as 19 million naira ($55,000) - more than the profits that he could recoup by selling his chickens.
Bamidele Oyeyiola ... has been in the poultry business for 15 years, and like the average Nigerian farmer, he relies on the local ecosystem to sustain him. Ironically, the recent heat has turned that very ecosystem into his biggest threat.
The farm where Oyeyiola rears 3,000 breeder-broilers - which cost 6,120 naira ($17) per chicken to produce, and which are among the most expensive chickens to raise - is a large open space with two big poultry houses, a water tank, a generator and living quarters that house six farmhands. "The cost of feeding is high, the cost of drugs is high and the cost of management is also very high," Oyeyiola says.
To create ventilation and airflow in high temperatures, Oyeyiola has built poultry houses that stand 13 feet high, face the wind, and are surrounded by trees. Constructing them cost 3.6 million naira ($10,000.)
Before Oyeyiola's hens can even start laying eggs, he feeds them for one year and four months and offers them round-the-clock surveillance. While they mature, Bamidele makes no sales. And during this time, some hens die - often due to extreme heat.
One of Oyeyiola's farmhands carries a pail of water to fill the troughs for the chickens, making more than five trips to the tap and back.
When the heat is unbearable for the chickens, Oyeyiola and his workers put ice blocks in the birds' water. But they can not regulate humidity or the internal temperature of the open-air poultry house.
Just as the Nigerian government doesn't help Oyeyiola with his chickens' bedding - sawdust that must be kept dry and changed at least twice a day - he says the government isn't lifting a finger to help his business beat the heat.
"If there was technology, the water would come there automatically, [and] the birds would drink at their convenience and adequately," Oyeyiola says. "But if you decide to put water in a bucket and the water finishes, the bird will also suffer, and that will also affect our production."
Oyeyiola and his workers breathe a sigh of relief around 4pm, when temperatures start to cool.
In poultry and piggery production, high temperatures hinder yields because they can retard reproductive cycles and boost mortality, says Adekunle Adedoyin Idowu, a senior lecturer at the University of Agriculture, Abeokuta.
Idowu notes that in Nigeria, mortality rates for poultry are increasing "to the level of at least 15 percent per annum".
The loss is not as severe on farms with modern technology, where yields and profits are higher. Agricultural producers who are wealthy enough to mitigate the effects of global warming can plant more productive crops and raise more poultry and livestock. This is why it is the more affluent Nigerian farmers who are now controlling the market, says Merlin Uwalaka, an environmental economist at the University of Alberta.
Olusola says he recently had to increase the number of times he gave water to his hens - and that he now performs this chore four times a day. "The weather," he tells Al Jazeera, "is not friendly to the birds."
Full article...
August 11, 2019
Rising Heat Making Nigerian Chicken Breeders Sweat
Soilless Farming in Nigeria
A video about a young man in Nigeria who is pioneering the dissemination of information about cultivation with areroponics, the technique of growing plants in the air by spraying their roots with a nutrient solution.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTyXYOpfQBI
July 19, 2019
Nigeria's Average Cassava Yield Rises From 11.7 To 15 Tonnes Per Hectare
Dr. Muhammed Umar, the Permanent Secretary in the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Developmen, represented by Mr Ayodeji Bobby, Head of Tuber Crops in the ministry...said that Nigeria remained the largest producer of cassava, adding that a total of 36.8 million matric tonnes of cassava were harvested from 3.13 million hectares in 2013.
He said that this was with an average yield of 11.7 tonnes per hectare, adding that this, however, accounted for an insignificant fraction of global value-addition of cassava.
“But because of the Federal Government support through the change agenda of the government raised the production to about 54 million metric tonnes at 15 tonnes per hectare and develop efficient value-added chains.’’
Umar said that this was for high-quality cassava flour, dried chips; starch and sweeteners; ethanol and traditional foods.
Dr Afred Dixon, IITA Director for Development and Delivery said that Nigeria’s cassava annual production was above 50 million tonnes, adding that the increased from 35 million tonnes in the early 90s was not by accident.
He said that this resulted from stakeholders in research development to all other aspects of cassava value chains such as processing, mechanisation, and markets.
Full article...
June 23, 2019
Nigeria To Ban Atrazine, Paraquat Use By Farmers
Nigeria’s National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC)has announced plans to ban the use of paraquat by farmers amid mounting evidence that the product hurts applicators and the environment.
The decision is coming at a time when new herbicides that are more safe and environmentally friendly are being registered in Africa’s most populous country.
“Paraquat has been banned in several countries and we can not continue to allow it to come into Nigeria, Other herbicides to be banned include atrazine,” a NAFDAC official said..
The regulatory agency also announced stricter measures to curtail the use of Snipper (Dichlorvos or 2,2-dichlorovinyl dimethyl phosphate) in homes to end the abuse of the pesticide which in recent times has been associated with suicides in Nigeria.
Full article... Nigerian Tribune
June 12, 2019
Nigeria: Onion Seedlings As Fish Food?
Onion farmers in Jigawa State are said to have faced difficulty in the last farming season following the acute scarcity of onion seedlings in the market. The seedlings became scarce after fish farmers discovered their importance in fish farming and therefore bought them in large quantities to feed their fish. Following the two phenomena - fish farmers and poor weather (excessive
rain) conditions - the onion seedlings become a scarce commodity and the
price soared by over 200 percent.
****************************************************************
Editor: There's obviously a lot of information missing from the article from which the above snippet was taken. Are the onion seedlings given directly to the fish for them to chew on?! Or are do the seedlings and the fish exist in some sort of aquaculture-type symbiosis? Inquiring readers would have liked to know!
Full article...
Read more: https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/how-fish-farmers-bad-weather-hampered-onion-farming-in-jigawa.html
June 11, 2019
Nigeria: Gene Modified Crops Debate Rages
... many African countries are reluctant to approve the use of GMOs.
Nigeria officially signed the Biosafety Bill into law in 2015, making it eligible to join the league of nations that are already using genetic engineering (GE), also called genetic modification (GM), to boost food production. Since then, there has been a protracted debate over the application of genetically modified crops into the food system in Nigeria. These protracted debates over their use and possible dangers have birthed two groups- Pro-GMO and Anti-GMO.
Despite the clear link between agricultural productivity and technology, there are, however, uncertainties and confusion in government responses to a wide range of agricultural, health, social, economic and environmental issues associated with the application and regulation of modern biotechnology in agricultural practice.
[..there is..] growing opposition by a coalition of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) against the introduction of GMOs in the country.
Director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), Mr. Nnimo Bassey, argued that use of gene drive organisms has the potential of wiping off whole species of organisms. He argued that doors will be open for all sorts of synthetic organisms to be released or experimented on in Nigeria.
President of the Nigeria Institute of Food, Science and Technology (NIFST), Dahiru Adamu, said,
“genetically modified seeds would make it impossible for our local seedlings to be productive for farmers and the nation. Once we allow genetically modified seeds to come into Nigeria to be planted by our farmers, which may mark the end of Nigeria. This is because by the time these seedlings are planted, one, two to five years, it will compare with our local seedlings and will not allow them to germinate. This will lead us to buying seeds from them and therefore, hold us to ransom, and become the determinant factor whether the country gets food or not and in turn become a big problem for the country.” .
...the Managing Director of Global Prolife Alliance (GPA), a leading health, legal and environmental organisation, Prof. Philip C. Njemanze, said, “In an environment like Nigeria where corruption prevails, the biotechnology companies could bribe officials to look the other way on crucial information on the health hazards of GMO crops.”
Njemanze said, “The rising rate of cancers, infertility, mental diseases, and autistic spectrum disorders in children in Nigeria is related to the increasing use of Monsanto Roundup pesticide – Glysophate. The pesticide when used kills weeds but spares GMO crops.”
However, pro-GMO civil society groups led by the National Biotechnology and Biosafety Consortium (NBBC) has said the development of the Pod-Borer Resistant Cowpea (PBR-Cowpea), a GMO product is a confirmation of our expertise in Nigeria to be able to provide a home grown solution to our pest and diseases problems in agriculture.
President of NBBC Celestine Aguoru argued that the modification of beans, just one crop, has brought so many benefits to the country. He said: “The benefits include reduction in the use of dangerous chemicals, protection of Nigeria’s position as the largest producer of beans.
“Reduction in the spending of Nigeria’s foreign exchange in the purchase of over 500,000 tons of beans annually from other countries. Farmers can now heave a sigh of relief from chemicals which they have to spray about 10 times for each beans season and that Nigeria is going to save a lot of foreign exchange used in the importation of chemicals,” said Aguoru.
He further said: “We are also using this platform to call on the federal government to ignore the call by the non-scientific activists to ban the GM beans because it is safe and poses no proven harm to human or animals. We urge the Federal Government to increase budgetary allocations to universities and research institutes to enable them undertake research that meets national aspirations as we have seen in this case of PBR Cowpea.
Full article...
https://www.blueprint.ng/much-ado-about-genetically-modified-food/
August 09, 2015
Oil rich Nigeria struggles to supply its farmers affordable fertiliser
Nigeria is one of the African countries that at State level would be expected to easily afford to avail its farmers affordable fertiliser, but that issue is a sore, perennially controversial one for the oil-rich nation.
The reasons for this are many and varied, and include the varying capacities and committments of the component state governments of Nigeria's federalised national governance structure.
Virtually every year there are widespread complaints of inefficiency or corruption in the administration of various fertiliser accessibility schemes.
In Adamawa State, farmers complain that promised subsidised fertiliser has not been forthcoming, well after the cropping season has started. “Lack of it at this critical time will surely affect our yield since we can’t afford to purchase directly from market where it goes for about Naira 8,000 per bag,’’ one farmer said.
(Insert: Naira 8,000 = U.S. $40 as at 06 August 2015)
An aide to the Adamawa State governor said that 30,000 tonnes of the still to be delivered fertiliser had been purchased.
Meanwhile in Bauchi State, the government has purchased 10,000 tonnes of fertiliser to supply to its farmers at subsidised prices of Naira 2700 (U.S.$15) per 50kg of compound fertiliser (NPK) and Naira 3000 for a 50kg of Urea, almost two thirds less than the free market price mentioned by the farmer quoted in Adamawa State.
Nigeria's average fertiliser use is about 5kg/hectare. For comparison, in South Africa and Egypt the figure is over 100kg.hectare, while in many developed countries it is over 200kg.hectare.
African Agriculture
August 02, 2015
African white star apple's commercial potential under-appreciated
The African white star apple, chrysophyllum albidum, is a seasonal delicacy in parts of West Africa, but even there has not yet found a niche as a processed product. Like many other seasonal fruits that grow wild, a season's harvest is almost all consumed fresh, and much of it simply goes to waste. It is high in calcium, and amongst claims about its benefits are that it can help in the control of diabetes and heart disease.
Farmers in an area of Nigeria in which it grows well are calling for efforts to value-add the African white star apple into various products.
African Agriculture
Nigeria: 'Lack of enabling law stalled cassava flour-for-bread initiative'
Nigeria is the world's largest cassava-growing (est. 49 million tonnes/annum) and consuming country. For many years there have been discussions about why the country couldn't grow even more (current average yields are 10-11 tonnes/hectare) of this resilient, drought-tolerant tuber than it does, and why there hasn't been more of a cassava value-chain established, given the huge potential.
One effort to address these issues was the Cassava Flour Initiative, which required bakeries to use a 20% cassava/80% wheat mix in their breading-baking mixes, in order to kick start a higher-value chain for it than currently exists. The initiative stalled for a whole host of reasons, including simple inertia from an industry used to 100% wheat bread, some consumer resistance ("It tastes different," some consumers said, not in a flattering way), claims of a shortage of baking-quality cassava flour and others. Noble as the idea was, it clearly needed a learning curve and many interventions over a period of time to actualise it.
A former regional business representative has blamed lack of enabling legislation and other support from the government as one reason the aims of the initiative have not been achieved.
Sakirudeen Labode, ex-president of the Ogun State Council of Chambers of Commerce, Mines and Agriculture said, "People acquired land and bought machinery for the ideas as part of the
input into the production of bread, unfortunately government is not
sincere because there was no law to back the policy that will make it
mandatory for the flour millers to use. Many people rushed into the
cassava ideas as they rushed and obtained loans from Bank Of Industry,
and other banks, while the business is yet to take off. These are huge
national losses. Government needed to make a law that will make it binding for consumption,” he said.
African Agriculture
October 11, 2012
Flood waters wash away crops in Nigeria
Floods described as the the worst in several decades have caused devastation in large parts of Nigeria, including the submerging of crops across wide areas, causing fears of a food crisis. Up to 24 of the country's 36 states are reported to have experienced severe flooding.
Chairman of Bayelsa State Cassava Growers Association, Mr. Ekiye Akainza described this as a disaster year. Many settlements, thousands of hectares of farmlands were submerged, with scores of deaths reported.
Tunde Arosanyin, an official of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN) said it was no longer possible to plant crops this year as farmers had already "lost the active season without hope of recovery."
He also said there would be low crop and livestock supply in the market
from December as demand would outstrip supply while prices would
skyrocket.
David Ogwu, the Laison Officer 1 for Ibaji Local Government,
expressed optimism that the rains would cease in the next four to five
weeks but wondered where the people would start from.
"Where will the people find seedlings to plant? Where will the maize
seeds, cassava stems, yam seedlings, sorghum and the rest crops come
from?"
One farmer estimated that up to 95 per cent of rice farms in Kano state had been destroyed.
African Agriculture
October 07, 2012
Nigerian cocoa output forecast to go up by 20 percent in 2012/13 season
by Vincent Nwanma
Cocoa output from Nigeria, the world’s fourth-biggest producer, may rise by as much as 20 percent in the season that started on October 1 as new farms begin production, an industry group said.
Cocoa trees planted four to five years ago in western, eastern and midwestern regions of Nigeria will begin to bear fruits in the 2012-13 season and raise the country’s output to at least 300,000 metric tons
from 250,000 tons last year, Robo Adhuze, spokesman for the Cocoa Association of Nigeria, said by phone today in Akure in the southwestern state of Ondo.
“In the past five years, Nigeria has done so much to raise output, and what we are seeing now is the result of that,” Adhuze said. The government encouraged farmers to expand their farms, replace old trees
and also taught them good practices, he said. Last year, eight new varieties of cocoa, with shorter maturity periods and higher yields per hectare, were introduced, he said.
Ondo state, the biggest producer, is expected to increase output to 90,000 tons from less than 77,000 tons last year, Adhuze said, adding production should also rise in Cross River and Edo.
Flooding in parts of Nigeria including Kogi, Edo and Cross River states is causing “anxiety” among the farmers, Adhuze said. “It means that output of cocoa from these states could be affected,” he said.
Flooding worsened after gates on hydro electric dams on the country’s biggest river, the Niger, were opened to prevent them from collapsing under pressure from “high-intensity rains,” said Anthony Anuforo, director-general of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency.
Nigeria ranks behind the Ivory Coast, Ghana and Indonesia in cocoa production, according to the International Cocoa Organization. Shipments of the beans represent the second- biggest foreign exchange earner for Nigeria, Africa’s leading oil producer, according to government figures.
Nigeria’s cocoa year is divided into two harvests with the main one beginning in October and ending in January, while the smaller crop usually begins in March and ends in June.
Bloomberg
September 24, 2012
Why figures of purported agricultural investments into Africa can be so misleading
Chido Makunike
Even if you're not particularly interested in farming news and developments, you cannot fail to be impressed by chancing across a headline like 'U.S. to Invest U.S.$6 Billion in Nigeria's Agric Sector.'
U.S.$6 billion is a huge chunk of money. Such an investment over a relatively short period is/would be a very significant development for all involved. One would expect to begin to see huge results from such a massive injection of money into an economy in fairly short order, even if the pay-off time for the investment is much more long term.
But over the years of hearing about all kinds of billions purportedly spent from local and foreign sources on Africa's agriculture, it has become clear that such loosely touted figures can hide as much as they reveal, and can sometimes even be almost meaningless.
Excerpts from the article:
'Foreign investors from the United State of America (USA) would invest $6
billion into Nigeria's agricultural sector, the Minister of Agriculture
and Water Resources Akinwunmi Adeshina has said. '
'The Minister said the funds would be invested on sugar-cane plantation
in the north and cassava plantation in the southern part of the country. (He) said the funds would be invested on sugar-cane plantation
in the north and cassava plantation in the southern part of the country.'
How was the valuation of the investments at $6billion arrived at? Who did the calculating - the investors or the government of the destination country? What is the break down of that valuation? Does the $6 billion refer to new capital/cash to be invested, or does it include many none-cash factors as well? Over what period of time is the $6 billion to be injected into the Nigerian economy? How much of it will be new capital from outside Nigeria, and how much of it is in locally-sourced money or the contribution to the 'investment' of the host government (tax credits, free or subsidized land, etc, etc)?
Does the phrase '$6 billion into Nigeria' mean the total value of the two investments cited, or just that part of them that will actually, directly be spent/invested in Nigeria? For instance, if $500 million of those $6 billion are to be spent on importing machinery from the U.S., it is misleading to account for that $500 million as going 'into Nigeria.'
In the case of this example, Nigeria would still certainly benefit from the $500 million portion of the $6 billion that actually 'goes into (or remains in) the U.S.' But how to value this benefit to Nigeria is far from straightfoward.
Is part of that $6 billion valuation composed of aid from the U.S. government, or is it strictly commercially sourced funds? If a big chunk of the $6 billion is in aid (not at all unusual in such big deals), is that portion of it going to be spent in Nigeria, or actually to pay suppliers, consultants and others mainly in the aid-originating country, in this case the U.S? Again, this would be far from unusual, but vastly changes the meaning of what a mere dollar figure represents in actual economic terms.
For example, suppose country A donates $100 million worth of tractors to poor country Z. Country A would stimulate its tractor manufacturing sector by paying them to supply the machines to be donated to country Z. But over the years country Z may have to try to fork out that much or more in spare parts, repairs, etc to keep the tractors running, particularly if the choice of machines (obviously dictated by donor country A) was inappropriate for the conditions of country Z.
Either a lot more than $100 million goes back out of poor country Z to rich donor country A for those spare parts (further stimulating the tractor industry of country A while having declining cost-benefits for country Z), or the tractors soon simply rot because the cost of maintaining them is beyond what country Z can afford. Both scenarios are part of the long, sorry annals of 'development cooperation.'
Another example of why context, detail and explanation are so important in a story headlined this way: Job-creation is one of the most hoped for investment benefits in a high unemployment country like Nigeria, or any other.
$100 million spent on tractor imports and maintenance over X years would have a much smaller social and economic footprint than a similar $100 million in the same X years spent on wages and salaries. The money spent on wages would have a tremendously bigger multiplication effect than the money spent on equipment imports, so in terms of overall value/benefits to the Nigerian/target economy cannot be calculated the same way. So throwing out a phrase like '$100 million investment' without providing these details and nuances may be thinly, narrowly and arithmetically correct but yet still tell very little.
Shallow and misleading as the heading and article were, they were picked up and re-distributed without question by hundreds of news outlets around the world. And that's how so much of the figures about inward investment and aid to Africa that are thrown about often have very little connection to how much actual, correct, while at the same time revealing very little about how much actual, real-world meaning and impact they will result in. Unfortunately, sometimes the more you read and hear, the less you know.
African Agriculture
June 06, 2012
Zimbabwean seed company targets Nigerian market
Zimbabwe-based Seedco is due to sell its first pack of seed in the Nigerian market during the 2013 — 2014 season.
Nigeria: new cocoa variety, ambitious sector expansion plans
The Nigerian minister of agriculture farmers in the country's states that produces cocoa will soon benefit from the distribution of a much improved variety, as part of the government's efforts to kick start several sectors of the oil-producing country's long-neglected agriculture.
Akinwunmi Adesina said the new cocoa hybrid was an improvement on the old variety and had the capacity to produce 2,000 cocoa buds per tree, versus 350 produced by the old cocoa type. He said the new variety had a maturity time of two to two and half years, while the old cocoa variety took four or more years to mature.
''We want to restore the lost glory in the world trade of cocoa,'' said Adesina. ''We have completely lost those things we used to have because of the excessive emphasis the country has placed on importation. In the past, Nigeria used to be a leading force in oil palm production, but Malaysia has taken over palm oil production and they got the seedlings from Nigeria. My job as an agriculture minister is not to import food, but to export food.''
Recent press reports indicated that Nigeria plans to increase its production of cocoa from the latest harvest of 250,000 tonnes to a targeted one million tonnes from 2018. Various steps are reportedly underway to increase yields from 350 to 500 kilograms of cocoa per hectare.
The rhetoric sounds good and there is a lot of it, but talk is cheap. Let's see if this agriculture minister achieves any more than the previous ones whose talking didn't quite translate into action; leaving fertile, wet and potentially mighty Nigeria deeply dependent on oil revenue and the importation of many food items.
African Agriculture
February 23, 2012
Cocoa crop pesticide runs out in Nigeria, threatening harvest
by Vincent Nwanma
Cocoa output from Nigeria, the fourth-biggest producer, is threatened by the shortage of an insecticide to fight mirids, the country’s cocoa association said.
Wet weather has brought on an onslaught of mirids, insects that attack cocoa leaves, Robo Adhuze, spokesman for the association, said on February 16. They could damage up to 40 percent of the crop, “if not treated quickly and adequately.”
Patemglobal Nigeria Ltd., which said it is the country’s main supplier of the insecticide Actara 25WG, has sold out of the product, said Patrick Ikemefuna, managing director. The company is waiting for more deliveries.
Adhuze is concerned because farmers need the insecticide immediately. “The rains have started and the chemical should be in use by now, but the likelihood is that the farmers will use unapproved chemicals or nothing at all,” he said. If that happens the bean quality could be rejected by the European Union and Japanese buyers, Adhuze said.
Output in the 2010-11 season was expected to be about 230,000 metric tons, or about 5 percent of global production, according to Marex Spectron Group Ltd.
Nigeria ranks behind the Ivory Coast, Ghana and Indonesia as the world’s largest cocoa producer, according to the website of the International Cocoa Organization.
Bloomberg
February 21, 2012
US agric group to partner Nigerian government in ‘Africa’s biggest rice farm’
by Maram Mazen
Dominion Farms Ltd., an Oklahoma- based farming company that produces rice in Kenya, agreed to start a rice farm with the government in Nigeria that would be Africa’s biggest with production at 300,000 tonnes a year.
The $40 million rice farm will reduce Nigeria’s rice imports by 15 percent and cut rice costs by 54 billion naira ($342 million) a year, Agriculture Minister Akinwumi Adesina said in Abuja, the capital, at a press conference attended by officials from Dominion Farms Nigeria Ltd. Terms of the ownership were not announced.
“There’s absolutely no reason in the world for Nigeria to be a food importing nation,” Adesina said. Nigeria must be a “food self-sufficient and food exporting nation.”
Nigeria is the world’s largest importer of rice, at 2.3 million tons a year on consumption of 4.9 million tons, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Demand in the country will be 35 million tons by 2050, Adesina said.
Nigeria will produce enough grain in four years to cover its needs, which would allow it to export to other West African countries and compete with Thailand and India, Adesina said.
The farm will stretch over 30,000 hectares in Taraba state in Nigeria’s east, according to a statement from the Agriculture Ministry. About 90 percent of the land will be operated by contract farmers, and the rest will be run as a corporate farm and for training purposes, according to the statement. The farm will require 15,000 workers.
Dominion Farms is based in Guthrie, Oklahoma, and operates a 17,000-acre leasehold in western Kenya, according to the company’s website.
Agriculture accounts for 44 percent of gross domestic product, and contributes to about 77 percent of all employment in Nigeria, Adesina said. Africa’s top oil producer spends “well over” 1.3 trillion naira annually to import the four basic food items of wheat, rice, sugar and fish, he said.
Nigeria plans to add 20 million tonnes of production over the next four years of crops including rice, cassava, corn, soybeans, sorghum and cotton, Adesina said.
Bloomberg
February 01, 2012
Nigerian regional government in rice cultivation deal with Spanish investors
The government of Kwara State in Nigeria has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with investors from Spain to develop rice cultivation, processing and packaging. The deal is said to be 'worth 70 billion Nigerian Naira' (1US$ = 163₦ ).'
The state government is to provide 30 per cent of the total cost, including 20, 000 hectares of land. The Spanish investors are to provide the remaining 70 per cent of the total cost of the
investment for the period of four years.
The Spanish company and the representatives of Kwara state government
agreed that the investment will be in stages. The company is to invest 70 million Euros annually for the period of four years,
making a total investment of 280 million Euros. Based on the
agreement, the state government will allocate 5,000 hectares of land for
the process for each stage.It is expected that each stage of 5,000 hectares of land is expected to yield 40,000 tonnes of rice annually.
more...This Day
January 07, 2012
Nigeria's cassava conundrum
Eager to promote self-sufficiency, Nigeria's government wants to clamp down on rice and wheat imports and promote the use of cassava. The plan seems sound, but farmers remain sceptical
Daily, on the outskirts of Abuja, Nourou Salisu produces nearly 10,000 loaves of bread in his traditional clay ovens. Nigeria's buzzing capital provides a ready-made market for his output, but that could be about to change following the government's announcement of policies designed to wean one fifth of Africa's population off its addiction to wheat.
Africa's most populous nation, once seen as the regional breakbasket, wants to curb chronic dependence on foreign food by clamping down on rice and wheat imports and introducing a raft of financial incentives ahead of next year's budget. The aim is to kick the sluggish agriculture sector into life.
Salisu, however, is sceptical about the plans, even if they are aimed at lifting millions like himself out of hunger and poverty. "Nobody will chop [eat] cassava bread. The cassava starch will not allow the bread be soft," he said, when told of policies that will compel bakeries to begin substituting wheat flour for cassava flour.
"We don't have the science [technology] to grind the cassava, to make the bread soft. Our customers will not buy it and it will spoil," he added, gesturing towards the dozens of bags of flour stored in the sweltering bakery.
Last month, President Goodluck Jonathan – eager to persuade his people to patronise locally-grown products –publicly shared a loaf of unsweetened cassava bread with his vice-president and ministers. However, his attempt to open an internal market for the world's largest cassava grower isn't new; almost a decade ago, former head of state Olusegun Obasanjo tried and failed to force bakers to use at least 10% of the tuber in breadmaking.
Billed as a central part of the new administration's "transformation" agenda – a sign of how badly Nigeria's agriculture sector needs fixing – proposals in a preliminary budget to slash a $68bn import bill include a 100% levy on rice and wheat imports next year. Wheat costs the government a staggering $3.9bn annually, while Nigeria is the world's largest rice importer – at a cost of $6.25m a day – even though its climate is ideal for rice growing.
Cassava is being touted as a potential source of food self-sufficiency for Nigeria. By banning its import from next year, and offering tax rebates for millers who use at least 40% of cassava flour in breadmaking, the government hopes to encourage production and spur businesses to buy it.
With the continent still reeling from food riots over the past two years, agriculture and water resources minster Akin Adesina believes these policies could spark the kind of "green revolution" which has largely bypassed Africa.
"We have a situation where we are dealing with large numbers of unemployed people and high levels of poverty, and these are the priorities of the government," he said. "We must create jobs locally through import substitution."
According to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation, Africa has more than doubled cereal imports over the past three decades, a trend some countries have begun trying to reverse through proactive policies. In Uganda, for instance, rice output more than doubled in the space of four years after a 75% tax was imposed on imports. The duty also spurred the construction of new mills, lowering the price of locally refined rice. Malawi, meanwhile, one of Africa's poorest countries, reversed its food deficit in just two years through a targeted subsidy programme that helped finance fertiliser for farmers.
Brushing off critcisms of protectionism amid a global downturn, Adesina argued Nigeria could follow suit: "Every nation in the world protects its markets and farmers. Nigeria's farming population is made up of more than 70% of smallholder farmers. Our policies are directed at creating new market opportunities for them."
Plans are underway to replicate a 2009 government-funded scheme that resulted in maize yields rising from 1.5 tons to 4.2 tons per hectare in participating farms. But experts say a lack of funding will make it difficult to produce 2.5 million metric tons of rice – enough to feed the country and leave an excess of 500,000 tons – by 2015.
Nigeria was once a net food exporter, but poor infrastructure, lack of finance and misguided policies meant agriculture was progressively shunted aside as the focus shifted to oil. But the country's vast oilfields have enriched only a tiny minority, leaving many of the country's 150 million farmers poor and hungry.
Past form has left many doubtful that the government has the capability or political will to implement effective change. "The problem we have is that some of the financial institutions and most of the infrastructure is weak," said Kamar Hamza, a Nigeria-based financial consultant. "On paper, the policies are very good. But when it comes to implementation, we have a parasitic civil service whose main interest is making money from government policies. They can easily hijack the plan."
Another factor is the government's financial commitment to agriculture. It has only allocated 2% of the budget (around $500m) to agriculture, making it one of eight countries that have failed to assign at least 10% of annual budget to agriculture, as agreed under the terms of the Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Programme adopted at the African Union summit in Maputo in 2003.
A string of failed agricultural policies has bred scepticism among farmers. Many complain that microcredit funds allocated to them routinely disappear into the country's labyrinthine political system. "And anyway, there are no roads. There is a fuel shortage. Are we to carry everything we grow on our backs to market?" muses Sunday Alachi, a subsistence cassava farmer.
His fears perhaps echo those holding back potential private-sector investors, who are needed if government policies are to bear fruit.
The Guardian
January 06, 2012
Nigeria removes import duty on agricultural equipment
As part of measures to diversify the country’s economy, the Nigerian government has removed import duty on agricultural equipment.
The private Guardian Newspaper quoted the Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Customs Service, Mr. Abdullahi Dikko, as saying the gesture would help to boost local agricultural production, generate employment and reduce youth restiveness in the country.
“We have realized that we have to face the reality of the times. Agriculture is a backbone of any economy. We are now moving towards agriculture. The President has removed all import duty on agriculture equipment and we try to patronize goods that are being manufactured in Nigeria to boost our own production, create more employment opportunities and reduce restiveness so that, at least, the country will have peace and we will move politically and economically.’’ he added.
Afriquejet
Nigeria to release Vitamin A-rich, yellow-fleshed cassava
In December 2011, Nigeria's National Variety Release Committee announced three winning varieties in a 12 year contest between thousands of entrants. The contest, in reality a joint breeding programme of IITA* and Nigeria's National Root Crops Research Institute, had just one goal: to identify high yielding, disease resistant cassava varieties that could help to tackle one of Nigeria's most serious forms of malnutrition.
Vitamin A deficiency, which lowers immunity to disease and causes impaired vision or even blindness, affects almost 20 per cent of pregnant women and nearly one third of children under five in Nigeria. Standard white-fleshed cassava is eaten by more than 70 million Nigerians every day, but contains virtually no beta-carotene, a substance converted by the body into Vitamin A. In contrast, the newly released varieties, which have yellow roots, contain around six micro-grams of beta-carotene per gram, enough to provide up to 25 per cent of daily needs.
Screening, selecting and testing
The breeding work, which has used conventional methods and has been funded for the last eight years by the HarvestPlus programme, screened up to 100,000 cassava seedlings a year for high beta-carotene content and other desirable traits. Hundreds of the most promising plants were then investigated further in multi-locational trials in 13 states, covering Nigeria's major agro-ecologies from rainforest belt to northern guinea savannah. Farmers have been key participants, both in the early stages of selection, in order to ensure that yellow-rooted varieties perform well against the full spectrum of farmer preferences, and in on-farm trials of the most promising candidates.
Measuring the beta-carotene levels in cassava poses its own challenges. The roots deteriorate quickly once harvested, restricting the number of samples that can be tested; this has prompted research into long-term storage strategies. But the breeding process has grown significantly faster over the life of the programme, with greater gene frequency achieved for Vitamin A and improved selection and screening. As a result, while the three new varieties took 12 years from first being crossed to being ready for release, a second group of varieties has reached almost the same point in just six years and contains nearly double the quantity of beta-carotene. Even higher pro-vitamin levels are currently being pursued, with the breeding programme aiming to achieve a target concentration of 15 micrograms per gram by 2015.
Decentralised and demand-driven
Changing the colour of a staple food is normally risky, since it can prejudice adoption by consumers. In the case of cassava, however, local processors often add palm oil to white cassava flour when producing the most popular cassava-based food, gari, giving it a golden hue. As a result, the yellow colour of the new varieties was no deterrent, and was even preferred by some processors. Farmers involved in evaluation trials were also impressed, the new varieties yielding up to 20 tonnes per hectare, comparable with popular white varieties, and having similar starch levels and processing characteristics.
Cassava stems are bulky and quickly lose quality when transported, so multiplying and distributing the new cassava varieties in significant quantities requires a localised approach. The programme is initially focussing on four key states, with ten local governments per state each cultivating a one hectare plot to provide planting material for village level multiplication. By 2013, the plan is to produce enough stems to supply 25,000 households, which will be available at no cost, on condition that recipients supply stems to two other households in the following year.
Providing financial incentives is part of the scaling-up strategy. Private sector companies and NGOs have been enrolled to train farmers in multiplication techniques and encourage young farmers to enter a potentially rewarding business. "It's a win-win situation," says Samson Odedino of Envoy Consultancy Services, which has worked with farmers to establish multiplication plots. "Farmers selling stems will make money, rural people will enjoy better health and everyone will be happy."
For HarvestPlus, which supports conventional crop breeding to address a range of nutritional deficits, the work in Nigeria is a pilot. The programme currently has similar work underway in the Democratic Republic of Congo, but beyond this looks to promote policies and institutional supports that encourage acceptance of biofortification as a strategy and yellow cassava in particular, across many more countries, including Benin, Ghana, Cameroon and Uganda.
New Agriculturalist
