World Food Day: GoalKeepers Report and Food Security in Nigeria II

World Food Day: GoalKeepers Report and Food Security in Nigeria II

As discussed in the first part of this article last week, agricultural data form critical pillars for building robust and productive agriculture, which is a solid foundation for achieving sustainable food security. Data generation, collation and analysis have to be skillfully done to earn credibility and confidence of the public before such data are acceptable for public use. It is based on this premise that the public presentation of 2018 Agricultural Performance Survey report was excitedly witnessed by important stakeholders. Participants at the public presentation of the APS included delegations of Food Agricultural Organization (FAO), Nigerian office led by country representative, Ambassador Sufyan Koroma, Country Representative of World Food Program, former and present Ministers and former governor, President of All Farmers Association of Nigeria, Arc Kabir Ibrahim and several other dignitaries. National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services (NAERLS) conducted the 2018 APS, which was a research on the assessment of Agricultural activities during the 2018 rainy season in Nigeria. APS has been an annual activity of NAERLS that showcases the crops production estimates, challenges to farm inputs, technologies adoption, and constraints to production, pests and diseases situation and market information. An insight to answers on the food security questions in Nigeria is readily available in the APS report. APS also captured information on Agricultural Project Interventions at the level of the Local Government Areas through states’ ministries of Local Government across the nation. Major findings of the 2018 are startling and revealing as they show the vulnerability of Nigeria, as a nation to critical factors of agricultural production. What are the findings of 2018 APS? How are these findings correlated to food availability and affordability to the generality of Nigerians?

Rainfall situation is the first part of the APS findings. Rainfall is a major and critical input to crops production during wet season. In fact, rainfall availability, occurrence, frequency and spatial and temporal distribution determine success or failure of a cropping season.  APS Report indicates more rainfall in amount and frequency in 2018 than 2017. “There was more even distribution across the zones, less dry spells and greater rainfall intensity for most of the north – central states. This accounted for the greater harvest forecasts for the year; unfortunately, too, the heavy downpours and high numbers of rainy days have led to nationwide floods and destruction of farmlands in especially 15 states”, the report added. Floods across the affected areas caused heavy loss in the production areas of five crops; Rice by 9% of the area cropped, cassava by 24%, maize by 8%, and sorghum by 1% and yam suffered the heaviest loss of 58%. The monetary aggregated loss for these crops is estimated to worth N595 billions of Naira. This loss is quite staggering to farmers and indeed to the whole nation.  Despite the challenges caused by the flood, the 2018 APS report presented a rosy situation on the food production of most stable food commodities.

Rice, the most stable food crop in Nigeria is estimated to increase yield by 7.25% this year compared to 2017. States with significant increase in rice production in 2018 compared to 2017 are; Cross River is leading with 24%, followed by Imo with 18%, Ebonyi with 16%, Jigawa with 16%, Benue with 15% and Bauchi with 14%, respectively. Maize, another important stable crop is forecasted to increase in yield by 6.7% from 12.0 Million tons in 2017 to 12.76million tons this year. States with significant increase in maize productions are Katsina with 21%, Oyo with 18%, Ebonyi with 18.3%, Bauchi with 13% and Taraba with 12%. Others states have less than 7% increase in yield, while few other states recorded decrease in Maize production. Abia state is one of such states with estimated decrease of about 10%. Similar trends were reported for other crops; Sorghum is to increase in yield by 4.5 %, millet by 5.3, cassava by 8.2% and groundnut by 4.1% in 2018 compared to their productions in 2017. The positive implication of this rosy picture of wet season crops performance is that prices of food items are likely to remain stable with insignificant inflation within the year. This is because the increase in food production for many crops is higher than 3%, a threshold value estimated to be the annual rate of national population growth in the country.

The report brought out a disturbing situation on livestock production in the country. This is a major area of serious concern in Nigeria over the years. Generally, there has been a consistent negligence in agricultural investment in Nigeria by governments at all levels (especially LGA and States) and private sectors; less than 5% of the annual budget of government at both states and Federal is devoted to agriculture; over 70% of this low investment goes to crops production at the expense of livestock production. To really comprehend this dismal picture, one can refer to my previous article titled “Sudanese National Agricultural Summit and Lessons for Nigeria” published in this Column and can be accessed via www.breakthroughwithmkohman.blogspot.com. In that article I compared the cattle population of Sudan and Nigeria. I stated “The national herd is estimated around 140 million heads of cattle (http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article58991). When one compare the population of 19 million heads of cattle in Nigeria with that of 140 million in Sudan, then one can appreciate the level of progress made in Sudan. This means there are 7 cows to every two persons in Sudan compared to one cow to ten people in Nigeria”. This situation has not really changed in 2018 as presented by APS Report.

The report recorded a cattle population of 20,231,598 herds in Nigeria. This is grossly inadequate for the dietary needs of nearly 200 million people in the country. The APS report urge Nigeria to do “more in area of policy to improve the cattle sector, which has served as a major source of animal protein for the citizenry”. On state-by-state cattle population, Zamfara state is leading with about 3.5 million cattle followed by Kano state with a distance gap of almost a million cattle. Zamfara state is also leading in sheep production, which perhaps explains the incessant activities of cattle rustling and armed banditry in the state. A holistic approach to triple the cattle population in Nigeria is urgently needed but first, herders – farmers’ bloody conflict needs urgently be addressed and completely stopped as it is a keg in a the wheel of national progress.  

On poultry sector, the report indicated an impressive trend; “the poultry sector is becoming attractive to the youths across the country, perhaps due to its low capital requirement compared to cattle, sheep and goats”. This is a potential area for massive employment generation among the unemployed graduates in Nigeria.

The APS report also identified series of constraints against agricultural production in the 2018 wet season. Among these constraints were crops/livestock pests and diseases, flooding, inputs related challenges, and grossly inadequate extension delivery services as well as security related challenges. The most serious impediment to agricultural production was reported to be the persistent insecurity flashy areas; among this category of constraints are clashes between herders and farmers, which 25 states reported, communal clashes due to land were reported from 10 states and insurgency/militancy were reported by three states. Another equally serious impediment to the agricultural production is the gross negligence to the system of Agricultural Development Program (ADP).  The ADP system is responsible to the grassroots agricultural extension services.  There are 37 ADPs owned and managed by 36 states and Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. The ADPS are vulgarly underfunded thereby making them incapable of delivering extension services to the farmers. The APS report indicated that 68% of the ADPs received zero fund allocation in 2018 while 27% received inadequate funding and only 5% of the ADPs received adequate funding to conduct extension services. This clearly explains why agricultural productivity in Nigeria is very low as the extension services are not available to the generality of the people.

Irrefutably, NAERLS, a research centre of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria conducted the 2018 Wet Season APS, which presented an all-inclusive picture of agricultural performance within the reporting period. The result showed general increase in economic activities in the agricultural sector, especially increase in cultivation areas and production estimates. New lands were opened up for production with increased gender diversification in agricultural activities in 2018. Average crop yields were however still below global and African averages.

The report recommended strong need to increase investment in agricultural mechanization to reduce drudgery and cost of labour through involvement of private sector, strengthen the e-Extension centres to boost agricultural advisory delivery and urgently stop the perennial pastoralists/ farmers' conflict through participatory involvement of all stakeholders. This report can be accessed www.naerls.gov.ng

While the 2018 APS report provides the latest baseline information and status of food security in Nigeria. What is the scorecard of gatekeepers report in respect of food security in Nigeria now and future? To be concluded next week.