It is five years since you abandoned militancy and relocated to Nasarawa State to engage in farming, how has the journey been?
It has been a blessing. It’s a blessing because I have always believed that development is a product of internal national structures. Development has never been a product of external structures, but internal local factors. Not external.
Why agriculture?
Has there been any industrial revolution that has been outside agriculture? If your car breaks down as you are coming here, you will continue your journey, right? But if you are hungry, and there is no food, there would be a problem. Every form of industrialization started with agriculture.
Control or potential?
Potential is important, control is how nations grow. The west doesn’t love us; we have to be realistic about this. If they do love you, the marshal plan after the World War ll should have African Marshal Plan. Did you have African marshal plan? If $50 billion was dumped into Africa like it was dumped into Europe, are you saying we would not have developed by now? But they didn’t care about you. So the Africans must have an agricultural plan that is focused on building agriculture for us. Like the President of African Development Bank Adewumi Akinwumi said, in 2018 Cote d’Ivoire lost a billion dollars because the price of cocoa fell, but Switzerland lost zero, because the price of chocolate did not collapse. Does Switzerland produce cocoa? No. Does Switzerland have machines that produce chocolate? Yes. And what is the raw material for chocolate? Cocoa. So Cote d’Ivoire produces the raw material and Switzerland takes the raw material and produces the chocolate. North Central Nigeria has the capacity to produce ginger for the world, but we import finished ginger tea from China. Are we normal?
From the way you spoke, farming is another form of activism for you having abandoned militancy, what are the signs that you will achieve your objective for going into it?
It is impossible to achieve objectives if the government refuses to be involved at the local and state levels. Governors should stop focusing on Fulani herdsmen. Niger Delta did not become Niger Delta from crude oil, they became Niger Delta from garri, palm oil and co. Today, Malaysia is making billions of dollars from refined palm oil. We are a country that is blessed. A family in Lagos started refining 100,000 barrels of crude oil with investment of $250 million. Dump $250 million into producing palm oil in the Niger Delta, you will generate in excess of $2 to $3 billion from palm oil and kernel refining every year.
The reality is that productivity is a product of sustained internal development that is people-centered. So, in reality, development has been a product of internally sustained commitment to your own growth, to your own processes, to your own development, to your own capacity.
Locally, tell us what exactly you are doing here?
Nasarawa State has the capacity to produce enough sesame seed, ginger, milk, and beef. So what do we do? The concept of Ruga in North central Nigeria simply puts together the majority of the concepts of the components of agriculture. We are not interested in demonizing the Fulani herdsmen. We are interested in the economy of the Fulani herdsman. Lagos consumes more than 6,000 cows daily. We can domesticate the production of cows for Lagos. By doing so, we are enhancing the economies of both Lagos and Nasarawa states. If Nasarawa can produce ginger, we can build a processing plant. This is what we are doing on this farm here. We also have processing plants for rice, maize and garri here in Ga’ate. We have the cow section, where we process animals for beef which we can supply to the whole country and poultry. If we domesticate production in Nasarawa, we will build the economy of the state. We are creating more jobs locally and we are enhancing the Nigerian economy.
Three years ago, you complained about inability to secure finance, lack of government subsidy, not to mention lack of access to fertilizer and other farm inputs and implements; how far can you sustain what you are doing on large scale with these challenges?
You must secure a low cost fund for the Nigerian agro entrepreneur to succeed. When Olam came to Nigeria, they did not bring Nigerian funds at a commercial rate of 20 per cent or more. The Central Bank is giving at nine or ten per cent, African Development Bank gives at 13 or 14 per cent, but Olam is coming with about three or four per cent, so imagine the man from Singapore coming with three per cent of fund and the man in Nigeria is getting it locally at ten to 15 per cent. Who has the competitive advantage? It is a man from Singapore. So the issue of financing … when they say the government has no business in business, I laugh. In 2020, for every one dollar that is earned by the American farmer, the government has over 50 percent of the dollar for more than 50 percent of its commitment, because it is government-financed. That is exactly what we should domesticate here.
The CBN and Bank of Agriculture are financing agriculture in Nigeria, is this not part of what you are talking about?
It is, but the Federal government alone is not capable of developing the Nigerian state when it comes to agro allied support. Only the Federal Government has shown commitment in developing agriculture in Nigeria. The states and the local governments are doing nothing. Investment in agriculture must be federal, state and local government centric driven into rural Nigeria. And rural Nigeria is cheap. Building it based on the existing infrastructure provided by players like us. We have 300 full time staff and employ over 1,000 part time staff during the rainy season. We are talking about financing, once the state government is not coming in, what the Federal Government is doing becomes a drop in the ocean. More needed to be done. Create synergy. You will practically eliminate insecurity by 50 per cent if you develop rural industries or rural farm settlements such as this one here where the Fulani, the Hausa, the Mada, the Eggon are in one place building a place in national interest.
What stage have you attained now in your attempt to have a commodity exchange?
The commodity exchange is not ready yet. But what we are doing is to ensure Ga’ate becomes not just a settlement center but a farm industrial park where whatever you want to buy in north central Ga’ate becomes the center you go to where there are markets developed within Ga’ate to help in growing that capacity to become a commodity zone. If you want to fabricate machines, if you want to build industries, the local people here can fabricate machines for you to use to process cassava into garri and elibo, maize flower. Here we process maize for mill flour and feed mill to our animals. Once you do that, you help in generating revenue and increase GDP for the state, create employment for the people, and stabilize factors around banditry, kidnappings and other insecurities.
You started this place with a N1.5 million, how were you able to expand to this level?
When we started, we approached Kiakia.Com and told them we have some funds, we needed a support structure. We went to Craft Fund, but the reality is that Craft Fund could elevate or kill you, because the rate is not sustainable in the long run. We went into building real value. We went into productivity and value addition that can sustain the business, pay off those who invested with you earlier and then create a future for your business.
When do you think you can do without Kiakia.com?
Productivity is the only way to become independent of Kiakia and bodies like Kiakia. Private lenders give you money at three to five per cent per month. It should be rejected, but where are the sources you can actually raise money from? They don’t exist. If you approach banks, they ask you for impossible terms to meet. You are forced to approach the money lenders because the banks are asking for high interest rates.
