The gathered momentum of the Agricultural Transformation Agenda has no plans to wane, as another milestone was achieved in Nigerian agriculture with the recent flag-off today at Sheda, Federal Capital Territory of the pioneer Agricultural Equipment Hiring Enterprise.
The inaugural event which was geared towards modernizing the agric sector had in attendance key policy makers led by President Jonathan GCFR, who was ably represented by Vice President Namadi Sambo, GCON, alongside other notable Agriculture stakeholders.
The Federal Minister of Agriculture Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina, while addressing the audience outlined the expanding private sector investment in agriculture across the nation which according to him is the beginning of a new dawn being experienced by small holder farmers who are increasingly contributing to the decline in our national food import bill from ₦1.1 trillion ($6.9 billion) in 2009 to ₦684.7 billion ($4.35 billion) by December 2013, and which is still in a declining state.
He noted that despite current achievement and available potential, low level of mechanization in Nigerian agriculture has continued to serve as a huge challenge towards advancing the sector, as the high cost of land clearing is a major disincentive for the expansion of cultivated area, especially in the southern parts of the country due to the dense vegetation; while the high cost of mechanization, from plowing to harvesting, poses great challenges to farmers across the country.
In his speech he highlighted that the number of tractors per 100 square kilometers in Nigeria is less than 10, in comparison to over 728 in the UK, 257 in the USA, 200 in India, 130 in Brazil, 200 and 125 in the Philippines. Therefore productivity per area of land and productivity for labor in the agriculture sector of these countries are much higher than Nigeria.
In his own words he had this to say on mechanized farming, “Nigeria must, as a matter of national priority and urgency, fully mechanize the agricultural sector. Hoes and cutlasses do not reflect a modern agricultural system; they reflect suffering. As we change this, we must also change the model of achieving rapid mechanization in Nigeria. We must aggressively privatize the commercialization of agricultural machineries in Nigeria.”
Further speaking on the changes in the ministry, Dr. Adesina commented, “I wish to state clearly that the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development no longer buys and distributes tractors, as has been the practice for decades. The Ministry now supports the private sector to drive the mechanization of Nigeria’s agriculture.”
The Agricultural Equipment Hiring Enterprises (AEHEs), driven by the private sector, will provide access to affordable agricultural mechanization services for farmers.