Governor Ben Ayade has charged the federal government to deliberately sponsor researches that would help improve food system in Nigeria so as to bring to the barest minimum the challenge of stunted growth.
Ayade, who stated this at the National Consolidatory Dialogue on the United Nations Food Summit 2021 in Abuja on Tuesday, said for the food system to bring desired value, quality of food should be of interest.
The governor reminded the federal government that the Chinese, after discovering that her people experienced stunted growth due to poor quality of food during the World War II deliberately sponsored researches that helped improve food system.
He explained that food fortification was “precision technology aimed at improving quality of food” and urged the federal government to, as a matter of policy, focus on food fortification while pursuing its food sufficiency agenda.
“Again, there is a direct relationship between hunger and anger. When people became hungry, anger sets in. This anger often finds expression in restiveness and all sorts of crimes. So, food sufficiency is critical but food quality is twice as critical. All tiers of government have the responsibility to ensure that technology is made available to farmers to help improve our food system,” the governor said.
Ayade who chaired the event on behalf of the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, maintained that the 21st century agriculture was driven by technology with focus on knowledge engineering, arguing that small-holders farming as presently practiced in the country was old-fashioned.
His words: “In Thailand for instance, it is the responsibility of the government to provide irrigation, inputs, extension services and off takers. The responsibility of the farmer is to nurse his crops. We still practice 20th century agriculture system in Nigeria. We must entrench technology driven agriculture with focus on knowledge engineering.
“It’s always very challenging for sub nationals whose federal allocation is not even enough to pay salaries to begin to focus on agriculture. If I was to speak at any forum, I would speak on food security, food system, theory and practice. In practice, most of the advice and suggestions given during the dialogue session are underpinned by financing. When there is no finance, there is very little you can do. The problems are known, the solutions are well articulated but the reality is that there is inadequate financing to drive the process to expected ends.
“The federal government has a responsibility beyond budgetary provision, to take an extra step in collaboration with the United Nations in order to fully achieve the objectives of her agriculture revolution. It is sad that Nigeria is number 2 in the statistics of stunted growth in the world. We must be very committed to addressing issues at sub national level. One of my key focus is agriculture.
“I have set up agro-based industries in every senatorial districts of the state. Our investment in agriculture is massive. We are the largest producers of cassava in Nigeria. In Obubra, we have set up a cassava processing plant, that will produce commercial starch. We are fortifying our variety to produce quality cassava flour as alternative to wheat flour. You have to have a combination of knowledge and funding to be able to bring value otherwise we will continue to remain at the academic level.”
