Nigeria is said to be producing a lot of rice locally but you can hardly find them in the market

By Anayo Ezugwu

AUDU Ogbeh, minister of agriculture and rural development, is one person who believes that there is sufficient locally produced rice in the Nigerian market. He thinks Nigeria now produces enough rice for export. In fact, he said recently that Nigeria would achieve rice self-sufficiency by 2020.

At a lecture recently organised by the Catholic Brothers United, a religious group at the St. Agnes Catholic Church, Lagos, Ogbeh said at the moment Nigeria has reduced rice importation by 90 percent, meaning the country needs just a little effort to achieve 100 percent. He emphatically said that in two years, Nigeria will exit rice importation.

Ogheh insisted that Nigeria is going to be self-sufficient in rice production and that prices are also expected to fall. But a market survey conducted by Realnewsshowed that locally produced rice is scarce and expensive in some markets across the country. Investigations in major markets in Lagos indicated that consumers still prefer imported rice because the local rice is expensive.

A rice dealer in Lagos, who gave his name only as Matthias, said he doesn’t sell local rice because his customers are not asking of it. He equally said that local rice is expensive.  “The local rice is scarce in the market and equally expensive. 50kg of imported rice is N14,000, while local rice is N17,000. So it is cheaper for people to buy imported rice and even for me,” he said.

Another dealer called Azeze said early last year his customers were asking him for local rice, and then he decided to buy one bag but found it very difficult to sell it. He acknowledged that it was very expensive. “I regretted buying local rice and it will never happen again. The first time bought, it tired my money down.”

But the story is different in the south eastern part of the country, where local rice is the preference. In Enugu and Onitsha to be precise, it is more affordable to buy local rice than the imported one. For instance, in Enugu, Chidimma Okolo, businesswoman, told Realnews that her children prefers local rice.

According to her, 50kg of stone-free local rice is sold for N13,500, while Abakaliki rice goes for N12,000.  “If you want rice with stone, you can get 50kg as low as N10,000. But the stone-free is as clear as the imported rice and very nutritious as well. I can’t remember the last time I asked of imported rice,” she said.

With increase in the price of local rice, the federal government on Thursday, September 20, called for support for farmers to make the price of local rice more affordable for Nigerians. During a meeting with rice farmers, millers and processors, Ogbeh said the need to crash the price of rice became imperative following the persistent increase in the price of the product, especially during the Christmas period.

He said the government understood many of the challenges being experienced by rice farmers, adding that adequate measures were currently being put in place to address many of these concerns. “We have been discussing the modalities to put in place to make sure that local rice sells much cheaper and that the prices can fall to the levels of foreign rice and eventually, below the levels of foreign rice.

“Every country in the world supports agriculture, whether they call it subsidy or support, it is exactly the same thing. We are happy that the CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) has agreed to bring down interest rates on agric and manufacturing loans to one digit.

“We applaud that decision but at the level of FMARD (Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) and BoA (Bank of Agriculture), we have set up a fund, which we intend to manage to support both the farmers, millers and marketers to bring down the price of rice because we are concerned about the cost for the Nigerian family. We want our people to feed well and feed cheaply, but these things have to be managed carefully because we are dealing with public funds,” he said.

Ogbeh stated that in the next two weeks, the government would be organising rice fair in Lagos, Abuja, Enugu, Port Harcourt and two other cities to showcase the achievements of Nigeria in rice production. “There are those who do not believe that Nigerian rice exists, but we know it does and we are very proud of the millers for their tenacity, investments and the pains they have gone through in the last few years in trying to respond to a national call.

“We cannot say enough about RIFAN (Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria), we are very proud of you because there are those who didn’t believe it could happen; so, we thank all of you. A nation does not thrive on an import bill of food of $22bn a year. We just can’t manage it and I want this message to reach those who keep thinking that importation is the answer; we don’t have the money.

“In two weeks’ time when we meet with the BoA and the millers, we will put in place a strategy to support rice milling so we can see what we can do to lower prices at Christmas.”

Despite government’s effort, flooding might derail the desire of the country to be self-sufficient in rice production by 2020. Across the country, rice farmers are counting their losses to flooding. Coscharis Rice Farm, one of the major rice farms in Anambra State, has been submerged by flood. Even the road leading to the farm has also been rendered inaccessible.

A drone was rented in order to assess the extent of damage; and from observation about 1,500 hectares of the rice farm has been submerged by the raging floodwaters. Shepherd Hurudza, farm operation manager, said the estimated damage on the farm has yet to be determined as the flooding keeps spreading.’’

Another rice farm in the state, Ojagbo Farms in Omor Community, lost about 200 hectares of rice farm to flooding after a major river in the area, Okpoto overflowed its banks.

Likewise, Garba Shehu, senior special assistant to President Muhammedu Buhari on media and publicity, lost his rice farm in Jigawa State to flooding. Shehu in a tweet on Monday, September 24, shared pictures of his farm in Hadejia, Jigawa state, which he said took a hit from the floods. In the shared photos, the presidential aide could be seen standing in a field covered by water.

While acknowledging the fact that floods had damaged rice fields, Ogbeh said the government had taken into account the suggestions made by farmers that it should look for varieties of rice that were flood tolerant.

– Sept. 28, 2018 @ 74:45 GMT |