FG to reduce cost of fertilizer for rice farmers, silent on Morocco deal prospects
Three months after the federal government sealed a supply deal with leading fertilizer manufacturing country, Morocco, there has been nothing to show as price of the commodity remains at rooftop in Nigeria.
However, the Minister of Budget and National Planning Udoma Udo Udoma on Wednesday said the government is working toward reducing the price of fertilizer to cut down the price of locally produced rice.
Giving the analogy on a television current affairs programme on the 2017 Budget in Abuja, he said that the Federal Government was collaborating with the Morocco Government in this regard.
According to him, “The imported rice is coming in; most of them are subsidised and undercutting the locally produce rice, which has higher quality.
“The problem is bringing down the price of our rice; we are trying to support rice production by bringing down the price of fertiliser because the price of inputs determines the price of output.
“We are trying to see how we can bring down the prices of farm inputs so as to cut down the prices of local rice in the country.
“We have an agreement with Morocco to import phosphate from the country to blend and support fertiliser production. The Federal Government is working toward strengthening all the value chains to boost productivity and improve yield.
“The whole value chain, first of all, you have to start from the seed. One of the things that the Federal Government is doing is to support the development of seeds because high-quality seeds will engender improved production.
“We are also working on fertiliser; what the Federal Ministry of Agriculture has done is undertaking soil analyses of all soil in the 36 states.
“And they have been able to ascertain the blend of fertiliser that is most suitable for a particular kind of soil.
“The farmers will now be advised on what type of fertiliser to use, so that they won’t apply fertiliser without specifications on crops as this often leads to low yield. So, we have that as part of the value chain.
“Then, we are giving support in terms of evacuating farm produce to the market by constructing and maintaining rural roads. Most of the crops get spoilt as a result of not evacuating them to market in good time.
“We are working on every stage of all the chain. The Federal Government is working with the state governments to achieve the objectives of this mission,’’ he said.
Continuing, Udoma averred that “the Anchor Borrowers Programme of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) gives loans to farmers at low, single-digit interest rate. In this manner, the government is intervening in various links of the chain to support agricultural production”.
