FG to River State: Unlock the potentials of the land for Agriculture

The Minister of Agriculture and rural Development, chief Audu Ogbe has emphatically called on River state council of traditional rulers to unlock the potentials of the state for the development of Agriculture.

Ogbe, as part of his official engagement in the state, met with the Rivers state Council of Traditional Rulers to solicit their support to “Unlock the potentials of Rivers state for the development of Agriculture;

“Our population is growing, we have to eat, we have to grow food and we have to make land available and put it to use. Niger Delta has land, it is dormant and they need to put it into use to grow food”.

He noted that the issue of land ownership is complex in Nigeria and urged the traditional rulers to find solution to making land available for Agricultural development.

The Minister said: “Agriculture creates job and wealth, if everybody is busy with agricultural operations; things will go down well with everybody assuring that the School of Agriculture in Rivers state would be revived to provide training for interested farmers.

“If all states of the federation grow food, food will be available and the society would be free of oppression of politicians thereby making our children to be less prone to political crisis”, he said.

The Minister said the present administration commenced the cleaning up of Ogoni as part of its determination to restore the land in the Niger Delta region and assured that government would do everything possible for Nigerian farmers to access loan at a single digit interest.

He assured that the Federal Government is working assiduously to put an end to the farmers and herdsmen conflict and thanked the state for their contribution towards the development of the country.

In his contribution, the Minister of State for Agriculture, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri disclosed that he did not know the potentials of Agriculture until he became the Minister saying,

“The most important resource Rivers state has is land and water resources which if well explored would be able to fill the deficit gap of 2.1 million metric tons in fish production in Nigeria.

“Bayelsa, Akwa- Ibom, and Rivers states among others should be able to feed Nigeria, the oil money goes to the Federal Government but if you invest in Agriculture, the money belongs to you and the land you have is a good potential for the country”, he said.

He urged the traditional rulers to make their land available for Agriculture in order to ensure food security adding, “The time has come and this is the time to make our land available for agriculture. Any land that is not put into productive use has no value.

It is when the Niger Delta embraces Agriculture that I will be happy as the Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria”.

The Chairman ,Rivers state Council of Traditional Rulers, the Amanayabo of Opobo Kingdom, Dr. Dandison Jaja expressed delight at the Federal Government’s call for Nigerians to go back to land pointing that the discovery of oil in Nigeria has made the country to abandon Agriculture.

He appealed to government to look at the prevailing conditions of the Niger Delta region in area of pollution by the oil operations and proffer necessary solutions while an enabling environment in form of soft loan for farmers and trainings should be created for agribusiness to enable the Niger Delta region compete favorably with other states of the Federation.