Quest for Food Security

Agro experts at a recent webinar on Nigeria’s food security agreed that that factors beyond poor budgetary allocations are at work against the full realisation of the country’s agricultural potentials, writes Dike Onwuamaeze

The panelists that featured at the recent webinar on “Nigeria’s Agricultural Sector Allocation Relative to the National Budget: Implications on Food Security,” that was organised by the Institute of Directors (IoD) Nigeria came prepared to say it as it is without mincing words. 

On hand to set the tone of discussion in her welcome address was the President of IoD Nigeria, Dr. Ije Jidenma (F.IoD). She said that the budgetary allocation of N228.43 billion for 2023 and N291.4 billion for 2022, which were 1.05 per cent and 1.78 per cent respectively were too small and too far less than the Malabo Declaration that Nigeria was a signatory to. 

Jidenma said: “There is need to address funding challenges in order to address growth in agricultural output. I am advocating upward budget review of the sector’s budgetary allocation across all levels of governments.”

However, the panelists believed that beyond the seemingly poor budgetary allocation, there are other factors that have constituted a stumbling block on Nigeria’s quest for food security. They identified vested interests of civil servants, lack of synergy among the agencies and departments of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD), high personnel cost and recurrent expenditure as major hindrances to Nigeria’s quest for food security.

They also said that collaboration between the FMARD and ministries of agriculture at state government level would be an important strategic step for the promotion of agricultural development in Nigeria.

They also tasked the incoming government to appoint a seasoned professional with firm grasp on issues affecting the agricultural sector as the minister of Agriculture, adding that agriculture should be the topmost priority of the next administration because the opportunity cost of neglecting agriculture is already telling on the Nigerian economy.    

They also stated that governments does not require open display of rice or yam pyramids to show that their policies are effective, as only low foods prices in the markets would convince Nigerians that their governments are doing enough to promote agriculture.

The first panelist to fire the salvo was the Chief Executive Officer of Iproduce Africa, Mrs. Aisha Umar, a legal practitioner and former Senior Special Assistant to the President Goodluck Jonathan. Umar pointed out that her initial exposure to the agricultural sector when she was a legal consultant of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development Water Resources. She was at that time instrumental to creating the legal framework for the reform of the sector and creation of some agencies like the National Food Reserve Agency and drafting of the bills for the establishment of a National Seed Council and the National Quarantine Agency.

The first thing she pointed out was that the budgetary allocation for agriculture might not be as little as it appeared if the focus would go beyond what is allocated to the FMARD and to include allocations to the departments, agencies, colleges and universities of agriculture and numerous agro research institutes that are being funded by the government both at federal, state and local government’s levels.

She said: “I will like to say is that even though the budget for the ministry that we see may be under 10 per cent, the ministry has many agencies and each of these agencies has their own separate budgets. If you are going to look at the entire budget of the sector and not only the ministry’s allocation, you will find out that it is actually quite substantial.

“The ministry of agriculture has 15 research institutes with their separate budgets. There are also universities of agriculture and colleges of agriculture. It also has 11 parastatals like National Quarantine Agency, the Bank of Agriculture, Nigeria Agricultural Insurance Corporation, National Centre for Agricultural Mechanisation, Institute of Animal Sciences, institute of soil sciences etc.

“But I think that all these bodies are working in silos and everyone wants to keep to its own rather than work as a team.   To be honest, most of the funding ends up being fretted away on meetings, training, and very little per cent of the allocation, at times less than 50 per cent, gets to the farmers. They take so much in running their day to day expense that they leave very little for capital development.”

She added:“I am sorry to say that there are some vested interests who do not want the status quo to change. And these vested interests, I have to say with all due respect, are the civil servants who are benefiting from the current budgetary system that we have.”

She observed that the civil servants capitalised on the poor knowledge of the minister about the sector to feed him with information that would enable them to sustain their vested interests and alleged that unaccounted money in foreign currencies are going into the sector from the World Bank, Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), etc. 

Umar said: ‘You know that Nigeria is a member of many international food orgnisations like IFAD, FAO and the World Bank are giving us a lot in foreign exchange and nobody knows about them except the civil servants.

“I think the budget is not the problem. My solution is that we need a minister that has no vested interest who and who will be able to control the civil servants. 

She was not alone in her observation. The Managing Director of Nigerian Agriculture Insurance Commission (NAIC), Mrs. Folashade Joseph, who was represented by Mr. Jerome Olowoyeye, said that we have to look beyond budgetary allocations to monitoring the utilisation of funds allocated to the sector.

She said: “I want to agree that more budgeting for agriculture is necessary but first it should be target based budgeting, not budgeting for budget purpose. It must be goal oriented budgeting.

“The bane of Nigeria’s underdevelopment is throwing money at problems while ignoring the fundamental issues.”  

“Secondly, I agree that there are no synergies among the parastatals. You will see NIRSAL competing with NAIC, which is of no need because NARSAL is not an underwriter but NAIC is an underwriter. What we are supposed to do is to synergise by finding out where NARSAL can help NAIC and verse versa so that our target, which is food security for Nigeria will be achieved. The new government must ensure and insist that synergy exists to push the agricultural sector to desired destination.”

Former Hon. Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security, Ekiti State, Dr. Olabode Adetoyi, added that strong collaboration is needed between the governments and the private sector for agriculture to perform at its full capacity and contribute 60 per cent of Nigeria’s GDP.  

 Adetoyi said: “The challenge of agriculture is about funding. Two, we have policy summersault. Three, there is no enthusiasm because agriculture has been relegated to those people in the rural area. We must focus attention on agriculture and in fact exceed the Malabo declaration of 10 per cent. If the share of agriculture to the total budget is still less than 20 to 25 per cent then I do not think that we are there already.”

He pointed out that there are challenges in the area of capital expenditure as farmers are not having good access roads and more than 60 per cent of their produce is lost.

“If you will ask me the new incoming government should declare a state of emergency in agriculture and review its allocation to 25 per cent of the budget. It should also pursue PPP.”

The former commissioner noted that the time has come for a professional to lead the FMARD because agriculture is a science based profession. “It is very important to have an agricultural professional person at the top of the ministry who knows his onions and where he is coming from.

He also argued that government must do more to mechanise agriculture in Nigeria by putting its own money and creating an environment that would encourage private sector investment in all the sectors value chain.

“How many tractors do we even have in the entire country? Some states do not even have up to five tractors. The incoming government must set target on crop production where we have our core competences. Like cocoa, cassava and yam for the south-west; south-east may be rice, oil palm and soya. North may be rice, sorghon, maize etc.”

Also, a former Chairperson of the LCCI Agricultural and Allied Group, Mrs. Edobong Akpabio, who is the executive director of Greenport Impact Cluster Nigeria Limited, harped on lack of synergy among the departments and agencies that are under the FMARD on one hand and no collaboration between the federal and state governments on the other hand.

Akpabio said: “The coordination between the federal and state ministries of agriculture is almost non-existent. For us it is more or less tragic that so much is being spent on recurrent expenditure from that little budget and there is absolutely no basis for an expectation of improvement in the sector nationwide.

‘The issues that are very clear from my experience working with the public institutions iare that there is no synergy among the departments, the parastatals, and agencies under the FMARD at the federal level. Also the coordination between the federal and state ministries of agriculture is almost non-existent.

She added that Nigeria would not have development in the sector as long as we continue to see the sector as a charity and social service where farmers are regarded as people in the rural areas who are supposed to produce for their subsistence needs and a little extra for commercial purposes.  Moreover there is no enabling environment.

The ex-chairperson Agro Allied Committee of LCCI, also noted that an effective PPP arrangement must happen otherwise the level of development will continue to deep further.  

She recommended Ekiti State as a good example of good collaboration between the government and the private sector.  According to her, the state government made land and land clearing available so it was easier for the private sector to pick it up from there.

“We are very conversant that the governments at all levels really do not have the dip pocket to develop agriculture. This is why they have to partner with the private sector very, very strongly. The private sector needs proper infrastructure, policies legal framework to be in place.

“The policy must have action plans to enable stakeholders to understand where the government is going and to develop the action plans. We have many agencies that have developed research documents that the state governments can use.

“SMEDAN has document on the agricultural comparative advantage of each local government in the country. It will no longer be motions without movements. That is why we need the private sector to come in,” she said.