Processors contradict Audu Ogbe’s national rice sustainability theory as over 20 million bags are smuggled in three months

Our Correspondent

The repeated claims by Audu Ogbe, Nigeria’s Minister for Agriculture that the country is now producing the rice consumed by its over 190 million people have been made a mess of, as Rice Processors Association of Nigeria (RIPAN) said over one million metric tons of rice have been smuggled into Nigeria in the last three months.

The Chairman of RIPAN, Mohammed Maifata, who made the revelation Sunday while briefing newsmen in Abuja said rice smuggling has reached an alarming rate.

“Investors in Nigeria have made (an) enormous financial commitment in the rice sub-sector. Unfortunately, the only threat to the industry’s total development is smuggling.

Over 1 million metric tons of Rice which is equivalent to about 20,000,000 bags of 50kg Rice has been smuggled into Nigeria in the last three months.

“Nigeria currently loses huge revenues, foreign exchange and Jobs to this menace as Nigeria rice processing companies are shutting down because of their inability to gain market access.

“More painfully millions of small-holder Farmers are stuck with their Paddy because the Millers can no longer afford to buy from them.”

According to him, investigations conducted by the association in the last few months indicated that “all our international borders have been converted to smugglers route and our markets are filled with smuggled foreign rice.”

There is the need for urgent actions to avert eventual national food emergency by combating smuggling so that we can continue to grow our local Rice industry and the economy,” he said and commended the efforts by the Central bank of Nigeria (CBN) in its intervention in the rice sub-sector of the economy.

He however lamented that investors in the country despite their financial commitment are met with the threat to the industry’s growth due to the activities of smugglers