Dons Eze
180 DAYS AFTER AGRIC MINISTER’S PROMISE, NO DROP IN FOOD PRICES
Nigerians continue to grapple with food inflation despite the promise by the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, that food prices would crash in 180 days.
In July 2024, Kyari raised hopes with the assurance that strategic measures would be put in place to address the high food prices nationwide.
According to him, some of the measures include the suspension of duties, tariffs, and taxes on food items such as maize, husked brown rice, wheat, and cowpeas.
He also promised that the Federal Government would import 250,000 metric tonnes of wheat and 250,000 metric tonnes of maize to be supplied to small-scale processors and millers across the country.
To strengthen dry season farming and boost productivity, the minister assured Nigerians that the government would embark on aggressive agricultural mechanisation.
These measures, calculated to calm food inflation in 180 days gave Nigerians a sense of hope that by the first week of January 2024, the prices of essential staples would have crashed.
Food prices
Unfortunately, 180 days after the minister’s lofty promises and assurance, implementation of the measures is yet to be seen as food prices continue to soar.
As things stand, a 50kg bag of rice sold for N85,000 when Kyari unveiled the measures now sells for over N100,000.
Besides the agriculture minister’s yet-to-be fulfilled promises, the government had earlier highlighted other factors that hinder its efforts to control food inflation.
In his last Monetary Policy Committee meeting, Yemi Cardoso, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, identified “the rising cost of transporting farm produce; infrastructure-related constraints within the distribution network; security challenges in some food-producing areas; and the impact of exchange rate fluctuations on the prices of imported food items” as some of the factors that the efforts to control food inflation.
Meanwhile, as food inflation surged to 39.93% with Nigerians looking up to the government for immediate solutions, the Ministry of Agriculture has not offered any explanation as to why the measures it promised have not been implemented yet.
Why govt failed – CSOs, farmers
As Nigerians grapple with high food prices, Civil Society Organizations, CSOs, and farmers have reacted to the government’s promise to crash food prices in 180 days.
Speaking with Vanguard on Tuesday, January 7, 2025, they pointed out that the government failed to put a whole lot of issues into consideration including insecurity, high prices of farm inputs, the exchange rates, high interest rates, flood impacts, holistic planning, and others.
The Chairman, All Farmers Association of Nigeria, AFAN, Federal Capital Territory, FCT Chapter, Nkechi Okafor, asserted that the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security had a very good intention to crash food prices but that lack of appropriate actions slowed the process.
Okafor said: “I can clearly say that the Honourable Minister’s promise was made with the mindset of a better Nigeria. But unfortunately, a promise can’t be achieved if there are no effective actions in place.
“Food prices cannot just go down overnight especially with the multiple taxation faced on Nigeria highways by transporters, which is just one out of numerous challenges faced by agricultural value chain actors in Nigeria.
“Can farmers sell their produce at a loss just to fulfill a promise made by the minister? Your answer is as good as mine. Can a farmer risk his/her life to the farm amidst security challenges, which is more critical in some regions, to ensure such a promise is met? Your answer also is still as accurate as mine.”
In his view, the Managing Director, EA Daniels Farm, Engr Daniel Ijeh, explained that one of the major causes of failure to meet the 180 days declaration by the Federal Government was due to lack of importation of food and other measures that were not implemented.
Ijeh said: “If they want to import to crash the price of food, what the minister is saying is the cost of importation is way lower than the cost of purchasing from the local market. And if you check the price of grain from that time till December, there was no any sign that there was importation at all because there was steady increase.
“That is why I doubt whether there was importation at all. Then the exchange rate was too high because I remember very well that around August, I bought some Dollars with N1,600. Now, I think around November Dollar was selling for N1,700. So foreign exchange rate will never favour importation because the price will be too high, and, you know, the people who want to do that, they will still be thinking of how are they going to make profit?”
‘All careless talks’
Also commenting on the issue, the Executive Director, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, CISLAC, Auwal Rafsanjani, said with the expiration of the 180 days deadline, the Federal Government should stop exaggerating promises to Nigerians and instead achieve what they want to do for Nigerians quietly.
Rafsanjani said: “We just want to advise that public officials should be mindful of saying things that they have no control over, especially when his (Kyari) principal says that he does not believe in price control.
“So, it is not good to raise the expectation of citizens, and the government is not there to intervene. This is the very reason why some people don’t want to believe in the government’s statement. Whenever the government says something, people don’t believe in it because they don’t rarely see any sincerity about it.”
Corroborating Rafsanjani’s sentiment, the Executive Director, Global Rights Nigeria, Abiodun Baiyewu said Kyari’s comments were careless and only further erodes trust in the government.
According to him, it was a poor attempt at rallying support for the Tinubu administration by giving false hope, adding that the minister ought to apologise to Nigerians for his ‘careless remarks.’
“It should have been clear to him that the reduction in import taxes were not sufficient to deal with the short fall. The exchange rate was still inordinately too high for private importers, and the time it takes in clearing them from the ports only further exacerbates their ordeal and raises their fares.
“With the rise in the cost of fuel, the cost of transportation and preservation also rose exponentially.
“If he is committed to ensuring food security, there is a lot the administration can do and he should work on implementing these,” Baiyewu submitted.
