Food security: we have had a bumper harvest – Minister

Gusau(Zamfara) – The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Alhaji Sabo Nanono, has expressed satisfaction with improvement in the country’s strategic grains reserve.

Nanono made this known while on an inspection tour of one of the country’s grains reserves in Zamfara State.

He said the improvement was achieved through interventions from the Federal Government to mop up excess grains from the market.
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According to him, the mop up has been able to stabilise prices and prevented farmers from incurring debt due to glut.

The minister gave assurance that the Federal Government would embark on more interventions to ensure adequate food to Nigerians and other neighbouring countries.

He said, “we are still mopping up 2018 and 2019 excess grains and this year, from all indication, we have had a bumper harvest.

“So, we are going to look at the situation and if it warrants us intervening again, we will stabilise the prices at the farm gate and the market.

“The basis for these silos is nothing but food security which is very essential for security and price stability for the benefit of the consumers and producers of these commodities.

“We are not here for failure, we are here for success.

“These silos are not only for us. You know Nigeria is a big country and it has brothers and sisters around.’’

He further noted that ensuring food security was important to Nigeria in view of the fact that it was not only feeding itself but neighbouring countries.

“Nigeria is biggest and probably the richest in the West African Sub-region. We have about 60 per cent to 70 per cent of the total growth domestic product and that is no joke.

“If agriculture is well positioned, you can imagine the buffer zone that we will create for people to come,” he said.

Earlier, Dr Sule Haruna, the Director of Food and Strategic Reserve, Ministry of Agriculture, said the reserve in Zamfara was automated to ensure transparency and accountability.

Haruna said that the reserve was one of the six reserves kept after the concession of some over the years.

“The silo facility here is equipped with standard 15 meter weigh-bridge of universal standard.

“It is an automated system and one of the advantages of the new generation silos over the old ones is that if any anything funny is happening, it will indicate.

“This is a 100,000 metric tonne capacity silo with dryers and automated cleaner and what we have here is sorghum and maize. If you go to other sites you will see millet, garri and other crops.

“Under the 2018 intervention, we have successfully mopped up 23,000 metric tonnes of assorted grains mainly sorghum and maize.

“Out of this 23,000 metric tonnes, we have about 9,000 for maize and sorghum 14,000 and the ongoing Guarantee Minimum Price (GMP) operation.

“We are expected to receive 10,000 here and as at today we have received about 4000.”

On concession of silos across the country, Haruna said that the Federal Government had concession 19.

He pointed out that the Federal Government had been able to mop up almost 54,000 metric tonnes of grains from the market.(NAN)