Nigerians kick against yam export

…Govt is exporting our stomachs for dollars, they say

Disquiet, anger and fury across the land have greeted Federal Government’s Yam Exportation Programme which took off on June 29, 2017 in Lagos. Our features editor, GBUBEMI GOD’S COVENANT SNR, in a nationwide survey with states correspondents, presents the peoples’ reaction to Audu Ogbeh’s brainwave of earning foreign exchange from yam exportation to substitute failed oil, gas and other sectors. His report:

It was a project conceived in desperation… and birthed in trouble. Stakeholders were not silent in sounding their warnings. Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh himself did not feign ignorance either. He had, in the beginning, expressed fear of the export dream putting everybody in trouble ! Hear him:
“I want this committee to begin to engage team of engineers anywhere in the world. Can we design a plough that can make the yam heap? We have to mechanise heap making, otherwise, in the next five years, because of our aging farmers, you will find out that we do not have yams again – and we will get into fresh troubles!’’.
He was that apprehensive, but a calculated $8 billion dollars earning per annum, appeared too good to drop.

Take one: The warnings
IITA: A stakeholder attached to the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture Ibadan, advised FG to develop improved strains through research and acquire the technologies to enable mechanised farming of the crop.
REASON “Until FG embarks on massive production of international-quality yams to compete favourably with other producers, we cannot talk about exporting yams. Already, the cost of this national staple is still astronomical because our farming, preservation and transportation methods are outdated.
“Secondly, FG must not place too much emphasis on the exportation of yams – until we have produced enough for it to be easily available and affordable to ordinary Nigerians all year round.” He spoke in confidence because his advice to Ogbeh’s export committee went unheeded.
NACCIMA: The National Association of Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Manufacturing and Agriculture said incentives were needed to produce enough yams for local and overseas consumption before we embark on exporting.
NLC: Denja Yaqub, of Nigeria Labour Congress: “The initiative could encourage farmers to increase output, earning foreign exchange for the cash-strapped economy, but government needs to reduce fuel costs for farmers, upgrade roads and improve storage facilities to cut waste in the supply chain – and ultimately lower prices of yam for our local consumers.”
Exporters: Mrs. Elizabeth Nwankwo, a yam exporter, representing Oklan Best Limited, listed some challenges experienced by exporters to include inadequate transportation and lack of quality seedlings. “Inadequate storage facilities also contributed to the rejection of the country’s agricultural produce at the international markets but I believe there could be zero rejection of the country’s agricultural produce, if these challenges are tackled.”
OGBEH’S OPTIMISM
“Oil and gas cannot employ millions of people like agriculture would, so we must work hard to move from oil to earning foreign exchange from agriculture.
“Therefore, this programme has to succeed; we must sell whatever we produce to the world because we are buying too much. We allowed ourselves to be deceived.
“I saw the figures of Ghana are earning from yam export and their targets for the future and it was quite impressive. If Ghana can aim at a few billion dollars a year from yams, there is no reason why Nigeria cannot quadruple that.”

Take three: Nigerians react
ENUGU STATE
From 9 o’clock market (Afia Nine), a major produce depot at New Layout, Enugu, Chinenye Jessica Edeh reports for The Daily Times.
One of the biggest yam sellers here is Mrs. Justina Onyekperem; she tells FG what yam export is doing to their people:
“What I should let the federal government know about this yam export business is that they are killing the poor families of the land. If they did their research well, they would have known that farmers now are not many and the few still managing farms are few. We have lands in Enugu enough for farming, but the same federal government has acquired the land here and there so planting crops we will eat alone, not to talk of selling them for cash, has become a problem here. Now they are exporting the little we have here for dollars. Let me tell them the implication of the yam export:
“Yam is not like gari, palm oil or beans they can preserve for a reasonable period; yam is fresh and it rots easily. If you store yam in a container, in a matter of one week or less, the yams will rot away, then you won’t get hour dollars, and our people will go hungry.
“Now, the price of yam here is frightening: before news of the export came, tuber we used to buy at a manageable price of N120 or N150 had risen to N500 or more and this was very hard for poor families to buy, and I can tell you that is even more difficult for us sellers to sell.
“We go far to Abakiliki and Benue villages to buy yams we sell; if you don’t go on time, in just about four to eight weeks the yam tubers are all finished.
“An Abakiliki, we buy one heap of 100 tubers for N100,000, making each tuber N1,000 wholesale price.
“At Benue, the heap we used to buy for N30,000 is now sold for N70,000. The breakdown of that means that the tuber we buy at only N300 before export is now sold to us for N1,000 so, how much do you think we should sell to ordinary poor people? And this makes the sales slow and difficult.
“So help us ask that minister (Ogbeh), how can he be exporting yam that we are not having enough to other countries? They should lift this burden from us the sellers and the poor buyers because we are finding it very difficult to feed our families.”
Port Harcourt

At the Choba (Zoba) main market, mother of three, Mrs. Rosaline Bob-Manuel said she had to chose between one tuber of yam for N1,250 and one derica of rice, “And I opted for rice because I could make rice-concoction even with vegetable and we can eat it twice.”

Her message: “Help us tell Federal Government that it is not yam they are exporting o: it is our stomachs they are using to earn foreign exchange to substitute the oil and gas sector. Ask them what they did with gas that has been flaring here since I was born.
“What about coal in the East or cocoa in the West? Or the one they call solid minerals in the North and even groundnut pyramids which I can still remember? If they could not manage all that successfully, is it yam that sustains poor families that will give them enough dollars to come out of recession?”

Yola, Adamawa State
Alhaji Danjuma Manu is both farmer and seller of yam. He spoke in Hausa to our state correspondent, Tom Garba at the Jimeta yam market, Jimeta, Yola North of Adamawa State.
“Before, I farm yam mainly for my family consumption; now I thank God that farming yam has introduced me to international business. With it, I can train my children to university.
“I want our federal and state governments to invest in the yam business because it holds a good future for the country. It is good also for government to empower young farmers to farm. Adamawa is the second largest state in yam production in all the Northern states after Benue and we need young people to come and take over from us.”
Yenogoa, Bayelsa state

From Swali market (pronounced Osuali) in Yanogoa Local Government Area, Sister Peace Priye, a retired teacher responded with anger:
Sister Peace Priye, a retired teacher responded with anger:
“This Minister (Ogbeh) is confused. Is it not the oil that they used to make themselves rich and throw us into poverty, that destroyed our lands and waters that caused all these troubles in the Niger Delta?
“Oil has destroyed our farmlands so we cannot farm our own yams to eat. We cannot fish also because oil has killed everything that has live inside water. Now the yam we can still manage to buy and eat with palm oil and salt is what they have started exporting to overseas.
“Let government tell us if we have enough yams at the cost an average family can buy it, before they begin to export it to other countries.”
“Yam is too expensive for the ordinary family like mine,” laments Madam Janet, a widow in the same market. “And if you complain, the sellers say they are selling according to the price they bought. If we do not have yam abundantly in the country to feed poor families, where is the wisdom in exporting it?
Lagos mainland
Household income under pressure, food prices on steady rise
Close investigation shows that prices of key food items have continued to rise since end of June in most markets in Lagos metropolis putting severe pressure on the incomes of many families. Checks around Mile 12, Oshodi and Boundary markets in Lagos on Thursday revealed that a sizeable tuber of yam which sold for about N700 in May now sells for N1,200 to N1,500.
Grandma and business woman, Mrs. Blessing Evheoghene of Silva estate, Idimu, sees another face of corruption in Ogbeh’s yam export business:
“Don’t be surprised that people who will gain from yam export are government officials who are doing the business. Is this not Nigeria? They will just go clear the tubers from local farmers at a cheap rate, export it away and leave the village people with little or no money and not enough yam to eat. Then those who are not farmers will be buying it at cut throat prices, which is what is happening now.
“If you know our leaders well, they make haste to do something only when they have personal interest in it. Do you think that minister is thinking of really revamping the economy to help the same government that ruined the economy since independence? Let’s even pretend to believe that is his vision, so he has to do that at the cost of lives of Nigerian families who are living below poverty level?
“I managed to buy one sizeable tuber for N1,500 at Ikotun market recently. Now, the price of one tuber in our local market is more than the money an average trader will gain on a good market day, so where are we heading to as a country?”

“It doesn’t even make sense,” said stakeholder and activist, Comrade Lamide Spencer. “The minister said he wants his committee to engage team of engineers from anywhere in the world to design ploughs to mechanise yam heap making. I said at that time that this man (Ogbeh) knows what he was talking about because our farmers need help, they are old and young people, even though jobless, don’t want to do manual farming.
“Then the next moment the same minister started exporting! Doesn’t that tell you that he and his team are after their own interests? Before EFCC will catch up with them many Nigerians would have died of hunger.
“That is how they claim they are producing enough rice and want to export. Show me one grain of government rice in our local markets: we still buy imported rice in our local markets; all that is government propaganda.”
Lagos housewife, Bolanle Akintomo laments that the yam export policy is going to compound the suffering of families.
”A tuber of yam that used to sell for between N200 and N300 Naira (63-95 US cents, 56-83 euro cents) is now N1,000 and above (about $3.2, 2.8 Euros). Now with this export thing, the price is rising every day.”
Ajegunle, Lagos
Madam Tee Kay is one of the big names in boundary market in Ajegunle; she sells just about anything sellable, including yams. She calculates that exportation of yam is government’s plan to “finish poor people”.
Her words (apologies for her pidgin; if modified, her message would be lost):
“Look, government nor dey think? Dis country wey get cocoa, coal, cashew, even groundnut wey dem call pyramid; where all the money enter? If dem nor fit manage all that, na yam, ordinary yam wey be poor person last hope na’him go change economy?
“Even if minister head bend, Osinbajo wey be pastor nor dey see’am? This one na mother of corruption: you think say na poor man dem dey think about? Na dem pocket the money go enter. I don see them finish. Make dem do’am; dem go come know say, there is God o!”
Warri, Delta State
State correspondent Isaac Olamikan reports from oil rich Warri:

Miss Rose Paul laments the high cost of the staple. “The price of yam has skyrocketed. Some months back you could get a tuber of
yam for N250, a big one for N400 which would be enough to satisfy a family of four. The reverse is the case now. The smallest yam you can get starts from N700. It is so sad.”
Businessman, Omooba Adedunle Adeyekmi mourns that yam has gone out of reach of the common man.
“A small tuber of yam which hitherto sold for about N300 a piece
is now sold for between N700 and N800, and the export is just beginning. What will happen in six months time?”

Housewife, Mrs. Ruth Olamikan confirms that yam is gradually disappearing from the menu list
of Nigeria households. “It has become very expensive by the day. The piece
of yam you could buy for N200 is now sold for N800. How can we manage through and for how long?”
Another businessman, Joe Ezeobi said yam has become gold, fit only for the very rich. Now on the export market, government is no longer for the people: it is every man for himself.”
JANE AGHO, a petty trader at Hausa Quarters in Warri where yam used to
be in ample supply laments that the situation has now changed. “Yam suddenly began to be scarce since they started talking about exporting it and the price shot up. Now, families don’t eat yam as regularly as they used to because of the cost. What do they want us to do?”
Nigeria yams for China’s industries
Beyond the nationwide outcry, stakeholder and public analyst, Dr. Jonathan Oswuagwu, told The Daily Times in Lagos that there is more to this yam drama than Ogbeh is telling Nigerians.
“We seem to have forgotten that this same Minister, Audu Ogbeh, in February this year, informed Nigerians that the Chinese government has demanded dry yam exported from Nigeria to meet that country’s industrial and domestic needs.
“Note this down: Ogbeh is taking Nigerians into more troubled waters because with the export going to Europe, America and China – with no farming infrastructure in place to boost yam production, anyone’s will be as good as mine where we will land in a year from now.”
“Moreso,” Oswuagwu pointed out, “China that wants our yam for their industries, is that not the country that is making recharchable lamps, fans, batteries and recharchable everything that customs people allow to flood into our country? If government had got its right from independence, if they had put electricity right, will China make so much money from us – and now wants our yams and cassava?”
Aging farmers affects all crops
“Then the key short sight of the Ogbeh team is that Nigeria don’t have farmers to produce yams for domestic consumption alone, not to talk of export for dollars.
“For example, the average age of farmers in Nigeria is a major setback to the country’s quest for food security, as the agric sector is badly shortchanged by aging farmers, a development that has seen crop output decline in recent years.
“As minister for agriculture and rural development, shouldn’t that be the first thing to look into before embarking on exporting yams for dollars?”
The public analyst regretted the absence of President Muhammadu Buhari, asserting that this is the time Nigerians need him most. When reminded that PMB, during his campaign had promised to diversify the economy, Oswuagwu said:
“Buhari promised to diversify the economy: he did not say he will export yam that is the only hope of the poor to earn foreign exchange. Buhari will recognise a short cut that will fail if he sees one – and this is it.”

Insisting that Ogbeh is putting the cart before the horse, Oswuagwu said, “If most of the yams we produce rot away, as the minister said earlier, whose fault is it? Yams rot away because there is no proper transportation of the produce to the people nationwide. We all cannot go to the farmers directly and the farmers don’t have the means to move their produce to the market outside their villages or towns.
Is that not what Audu Ogbeh should be looking to solve instead of taking a short cut at lifting the yams out for export to earn $8 billion to help whose economy? How would a mere $8 billion impart on the domestic finance of impoverished Nigerian families?
“And even if he hits that target in one year, given all these problems he is overlooking, where would the yams come from for him to export the following year? Then there won’t be farmers to continue, there won’t be yams for local consumption and there won’t be any for export.
“Who knows? Maybe Ogbe will resort to importing yams from Ghana to feed the very rich – so what becomes of the poor families whose votes still count in subsequent elections? We really need the President back on the saddle!”