The Federal Government says it has implemented short-term plans to make essential farm inputs more affordable and accessible to farmers through a transparent and accountable process.
The Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, stated this in Calabar during the official distribution of farm tools, at no cost, to some farmers in the State with the theme, “Inputs Distribution for All Year Round Farming.”
In July 2023, the President Bola Tinubu administration declared a state of emergency on food security aimed at addressing the underlying challenges impacting food sufficiency in the country.
As part of its resolve to mitigate the food crisis, the Federal Government said it has, at various stages, demonstrated capacity to transform the agriculture sector by prioritizing food security and distributing free farm equipment to farmers.
The Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, who was represented by a Director in the Ministry, Mr. Iwara Bassey said the Ministry has also rolled out programmes and projects to address some challenges faced by farmers.
“The present administration is implementing numerous economic reforms to stimulate productive capacity. We have examined what needs to change and what we need to do to realign existing initiatives and programmes that are on course to be in line with the core mandate of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security.
“Going forward, we commit to ensuring all our sectoral programmes and initiatives in the sector are aligned with actualizing the president’s priority,” he stressed.
Senator Kyari maintained that the Ministry is committed to promoting and creating synergies with the private sector to enhance food security, drive economic growth, create jobs, and reduce poverty.
“It is the resolve of the present adminstation to attain the objectives of the sustainable goals especially that of the zero hunger while also mitigating the food crises in the country. Our foremost concern is the facilitation of agro-inputs and basic farm machinery to small scale farmers who are constrained by the high market cost of these essential inputs and thus need assistance,” he said.
“To actualise the presidential priority the Federal and State governments continually engage towards addressing all issues affecting national food security objectives,” the Minister stated. “We also believe that involving the non-governmental organizations and the private sector will enhance efforts at ensuring food security, economic growth, job creation and poverty reduction. With this in place, food will be available, affordable and accessible across the country.”
In a welcome address, the Coordinator, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security in Cross River State, Elder Ekori Ekori, advised farmers to use every government-given farm tool effectively and warned that stringent mechanisms are in place to check defaulters who sell off freely-distributed government farming tools.
“I want to also plead that we put these items in the manner where they are supposed to be used. I’m pleased to inform you that follow-up mechanisms have been established to prevent the misuse or resale of these items. This programme is designed to boost food production and reduce the cost of living and that can only be realized if you utilize all the items distributed to you,” he stressed.
Some beneficiaries, Mr. Nkor Nkor and Mrs. Veronica Adinya, thanked the President for his unrelenting efforts at ensuring food security and appreciated his assistance to farmers with modern farming equipment to ameliorate the challenges they encounter.
However, one of the farmers at the event, Mr. Asuqwo Edet, appealed to the government to introduce training programmes to equip farmers with the skills to handle modern farming equipment effectively.
Some of the farm inputs distributed to the farmers include Power Tillers, Knapsack Sprayers, Water Pumps, Herbicides, and Liquid fertilizers, among others.
