ActionAid expresses concern over poor agriculture funding

ActionAid Nigeria has expressed concern about the inability of Nigeria to meet the stipulated 10 percent financial commitment to Agriculture as agreed at Malabu Declaration on Food Sustainability.

The African Heads of State in 2014 entered into an agreement to halve the poor indices of hunger by 2052.

However, since the declaration, experts have raised concerns that without increased public financing of extension services, the country may never fulfil its part of the bargain.

Corroborating these claims in Abuja, on Tuesday, the Food and Agriculture Programme Coordinator, ActionAid Nigeria, Azubike Nwokoye presented a score card showing Nigeria’s poor performance in the areas of agriculture financing and extension services.

Nwokoye lamented that Nigeria has only achieved two percent of the stipulated financial commitment to agriculture as entered into by heads of state some years back.

“Increased funding should be able to contribute to the amount in terms of meeting the Malabu agreement of food security, which even the federal government is only at two per cent.

“Currently the situation is one extension service officer to 10,000 farmers,” he said.

He said the reason the World Bank pulled out of extension services in Nigeria was because many of the states did not pay their counterpart fund.

The Civil Society group said the survey they conducted in eight states of Gombe, Kwara, Bauchi, Delta, Ebonyi, Kogi, Ondo and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), showed that major agriculture development programmes were under-funded and uncertainties shrouded the disbursement of budgeted funds.

The civil society recommended the increased funding of extension workers especially in flood affected areas to provide needed technical support for reclaiming the lands after the disaster.

They further reiterated the need for increased funding and timely allocation of resources to provide extension services for smallholder farmers and women.