The Federal Government on Monday declared that the
price of rice would start to fall from November this year.
It stated that more Nigerians had returned to their various
farms, adding that at the next harvesting season next
month, the price of rice would start to crash.
This came as the government said that the delay in the
approval of the 2016 budget had made it impossible to
implement the capital expenditure in the agricultural
sector.
The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief
Audu Ogbeh, said this while addressing members of the
Senate Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development
at the headquarters of the ministry in Abuja.
Ogbeh, who stated that the government could not be
involved in the importation of rice as speculated in some
quarters, stressed that his ministry would not encourage
rice importation because it would be detrimental to local
production.
He said the Federal Government was against rice
smuggling and noted that the Seme border had become a
notorious route for the smuggling of contraband products
into the country.
Early last month, the government had warned that the
price of rice might hit N40,000 a bag. It is currently being
sold around N20,000.
The Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural
Development, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, said that the
$22bn annual food import bill had led to the astronomical
rise in the price of rice and other commodities.
He stressed that if Nigerians failed to produce some of the
items being imported before December, the price of rice
could skyrocket to N40,000 a bag.
According to him, his ministry has spent just N882.58m,
representing four per cent of the N21bn budgeted for it in
the 2016 Appropriation Act.
Ogbeh further stated that his ministry inherited N67bn
debt when the present administration came on board, but
added that N20bn had been paid to agro-dealers and
distributed 900 million oil palm seedlings to farmers
across the country.
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“We will not encourage rice importation and there
is no way our ministry or government can be
involved in importing rice when we are working
hard to be self-sufficient in local production. By
November when the full-scale harvest starts, rice
prices will fall,” the minister said.
“ ”
On why the ministry had yet to start
implementing its capital budget, Ogbeh said, “It
is about now that the capital expenditure is
beginning. One of the reasons why money is not
circulating is that we need to follow the due
process on issues of procurement,
advertisement and others.”
“ ”
He also said, “You may be surprised to know that
only six to seven states in Nigeria are showing
enthusiasm in agriculture. Some by nature don’t
seem interested, while others just can’t connect
with whatever we are doing at the federal level.”
“ ”
