No fewer than 2.4 million farmers will benefit from a N600 billion loan facility under the federal government’s Agro-Processing Productivity Enhancement and Livelihood Improvement Support project (APPEALS).
This was disclosed by President Muhammadu Buhari at the opening of the National Agricultural Show/Exhibition of the 2021 World Food Day with the theme: “Our Actions are our Future. Better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life.”
The president, who was represented by the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Mohammed Abubakar, said the administration was doing its best to address challenges facing Nigeria’s agricultural sector.
According to him, “the gesture will support farmers in the country, to improve their productivity aimed at boosting the country’s food security, improving farmers’ production and increasing exports.
“It is gratifying that the sector is being treated as a business, no longer as a development project, with massive distribution of high quality farm inputs, dissemination of appropriate research results and significant enhancement of the agricultural commodity value chains.
“I would wish to reiterate and it is clear that if the agricultural sector must be made more productive and food systems sustainable, we must all be prepared to invest massively in the sector and rise to the call against looming food crisis as predicted by the World Bank, FAO, AfDB and other key actors in food and agriculture.”
Buhari added that Nigeria recorded a boost in the production of her major staple crops, especially maize and rice, which rose from 12.8 and 12.3 to 13.94 and 14.28 million metric tonnes (MMT).
“The same is obtainable for cassava, whose production rose from 58.47 MT in 2018 to 73.91MT and is even projected to rise to 93.6 by 2023.
“Growth has also been recorded for groundnut, tomatoes, and sorghum production. Cattle beef, dairy and fish production also rose by 166 per cent, 146 per cent, and 11 per cent, respectively between 2020 and 2021.
“The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the National Bureau of Statistics report indicates that Nigeria’s nationala gricultural import bill also reduced from 1.2 to 1.1 billion Naira,” he said.
