If Nigeria fails to start producing rice, by December 2016, the price of a bag of rice could be N40,000, says the Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural Development, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri.
Lokpobiri, who made this known at a town hall meeting in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, Saturday, said that Nigeria spends about $22bn a year on importation of food into the country.
He said, “For your information, we spend about $22bn a year importing food into Nigeria. We know how many more dollars they bought and that is why you see the price of rice going up. “Price of rice was may be N12,000 some months ago, but it is now about N26,000 and if we don’t start producing, by December it could be N40,000.
“Rice matures in three months. So, this is a wake-up call for Bayelsa people to take the four farms we have seriously. The federal government has four farms in the state in our records. The average land you see in Bayelsa can grow rice, so the colonial masters were not wrong in their assessment when they said Niger Delta could feed not only Nigerian but also the entire West Africa sub-region.
“Unfortunately, agriculture till today, is not a priority of the Niger Delta as far as the state governments are concerned because of oil.” He said the states in the Niger Delta had yet to give priority to agriculture the way the North-West states such as Kebbi, Jigawa, Kano as well as other states like Lagos, Ebonyi, Anambra, prioritised it.
He went further to say that, Anambra State for instance, was not owing salaries despite the fact that it does not have oil but raking in money by merely exporting vegetables. (TVC)
For crying out loud, are we so ‘dysfunctional’in Nigeria that we are unable to think through the principles of ‘foregone alternatives’. I am not certain that RICE as always been a Nigerian staple diet but I can assume that it was an elitist menu in those years when colonialism and education puts it as a menu for the general populace. Yorubas would say that ‘Nkan to a nta ko ni a nje’ -not what we sell we eat. Must we always stick to a particular diet when/if it becomes hard to come by? IF rice is so golden, expensive but with non-recordable value, I’d rather have my ‘OGI and Akara’ in the morning, Eba/Amala in the afternoon, and Agidi and Moin-moin for supper.Why are we so negatively rigid and set in ways that erode our creativity, innovativeness and adaptability- all fitting into elements of change. Seems many of us are ‘glutton for punishment’ The clamour for maintaining standards has so far reduced the general sensibility to docile magnitude that we are now being told what we should know. Our elders before us lived off the land successfully just as the white man would settle for salad, cheese and a glass of wine for lunch; which has more than fulfillingness of hunger but also add-on creativity and class. What happened to Boli and Epa, Mushy beans and gari, Boiled/Roasted corn with pear/groundnut respectively. Why can’t the responsible government establishments undertake a national awareness – raising forum to re-orientate and induct the masses about how to survive in the face of adversity instead of becoming the harbinger of doom….where I feel that our current representatives:ministerial and all, have yet to get a grip on the enormity and challenges of their collective and individual roles.