Nigeria’s Agriculture needs N1tr to bridge lending gaps, says Dangote
The Nigerian Agriculture Business Group (NABG) has said that it the agricultural sector needs about N1trillion to bridge the lending gap targets for financing of agriculture, food and beverage industry.
The chairman of the NABG, Alh. Sani Dangote, who made the proposal yesterday in Abuja during the a presentation of an Implementation Partnership Proposal to the Minister of Agriculture disclosed that the N780billion made available for agriculture lending was not adequate enough to increase the country Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
According to him, a breakdown of the figure revealed that about N350billion is made available for agricultural funding by the Deposit Money Banks and the Nigeria Incentive Risk Sharing for Agricultural lending (NIRSAL), while the Micro Small and Medium Scale Enterprise (MSME) made available N220billion for the sector.
“The Commercial and Agricultural Credit Scheme of the Central Bank made available N200billion, from the Bank of Agriculture and Bank of Industry the agricultural funding is N120billion and the budget for the sector is about N76billion,” he said
Dangote maintained that to resolve the agricultural financing constraints, all government intervention funds must be channeled through Bank of Agriculture, Bank of Industry and NIRSAL Guarantee Schemes for Agricultural Commodities Value Chain Financing.
He further opined that to revitalize Agriculture Financing there is an urgent need to recapitalize and Partially Privatize BOA alongside recapitalise NIRSAL to De-Risk Value Chain lending.
The Group further urged government to arrange farmers into clusters so as to able them have access finance and the private sector can easily work with them providing them with irrigation facilities, storage facility, linking them to market opportunities through government support.
He stressed the need for a strong Public-Private Implementation partnership to jump start the Policy and Legislative reforms in support of the Green Alternative between 2016-2019, he said that it is expected that N3.1trillion agricultural funds would be made available at5 percent interest rate by the end of the project.
He said it is expected that about 38,700 farmers co-operatives would have been established across the 774 Local Government Areas and about 3.8million hectare of farm land would be put under cultivation at 2crop cycles per year.
Dangote said it is also aimed 6 Marketing Cooperation are established and 29million mt tones of food are further produced adding that 7staple food that should be prioritize include Rice, Maize, Soybeans, Wheat, Sorghum, Cassava, Livestock products including fish and aquaculture also the 7priority cash crops include Cocoa, Groundnut, Rubber, Palm oil, Gum Arabic, Cashew, Sesame.
He said the policy objectives should be centred around recapitalization of BOA and NIRSAL, Liberalisation of the Nigerian Agricultural Insurance Cooperation (NAIC), establishment of farming Co-operatives and Clusters,
