Importation of grasses: Need for a rethink

Can you believe that in the face of dwindling revenue, no thanks to the instability in crude oil price in the international market, the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration has embarked on a project that will further deplete the nation’s foreign reserve?

This is exactly what Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, implied last Wednesday, when he disclosed that the Federal Government is importing grasses from Brazil to be used to feed cows in the northern part of the country.

The decision, according to Ogbeh, which is a component part of government’s planned grazing reserves to be set up across the country, is to curtail the frequent clashes between arm bearing Fulani cattle breeders and farmers.

According to the minister, if Saudi Arabia with the largest cattle ranch in the world can grow its grass for the cows in the United States of America, Nigeria should be able to do same.

No doubt, it is the responsibility of the government to choose how best to solve the intermittent clashes between cattle breeders and farmers across the country and the attendant loss of lives and property. However, many see the decision to import grasses from Brazil as not in Nigeria’s best interest. This is because it will not only deplete the nation’s foreign reserve but keep people in Brazil and other countries from where the grasses are being imported in employment while a large number of Nigerians remain unemployed.

The decision is also an indictment on the Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources, which has several research institutes under it. Had these institutes been at their best, they would have long before now come up with improved grass varieties that can be grown in massive quantities across the country for feeding of cows and there would be no need to use part of our foreign reserve to pay for imported grasses.

So, if President Buhari during an interview with a cable station, Aljazeera, last weekend, said Nigeria in the light of dwindling revenue cannot afford foreign exchange for students studying abroad, then using part of our foreign reserve to import grasses from Brazil to feed cows surely needs to be revisited.