By PHILIP Onah
Former Minister of Agriculture and chairman of Trustees of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Dr Shettima Mustapha, has called for the shift of May 29 handover date to another date to boost food security and the development of agricultural sector.
He, therefore, said 2015 was not an agriculture year due to electioneering activities that took most part of the year, which according to him is one major problem that militated against sustained development of agriculture and meeting food security challenge in Nigeria.
Mustapha, who is also former defense minister, disclosed this to journalist in his Abuja office, noted that because Nigeria has a mono-season agriculture with May right in the centre of the planting (rainy) season, that period should be spared of any distraction in the guise of politics for the government to concentrate on its agricultural programmes.
He said, “That was one among the several fundamental issues that I raised in the convocation lecture I delivered at Federal University of Agriculture, Makurdi at the end of last year. Our handover date of May 29 was ill-fixed because it is the peak of the planting season and Nigeria being a mono-season agriculture cannot afford to use that period politicking at the expense of Agriculture, a sector supposed to be the mainstay of Nigeria’s economy all things being equal. So I am advocating a shift of that date if we must go the way of agriculture to achieve food security in this country.”
Mustapha equally condemned what he called short-term plan for agriculture, saying Nigeria cannot get right by embarking on two to three years plan.
According to him, it pays to look at a period of 10 years or beyond with proper projections made concerning demography as to what human and animal population is now and what it is likely to become at the long run.
Mustapha however lauded the move by the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government to revive the agricultural sector in the face of the dwindling fortunes of the petroleum industry saying “this is what some of us have been saying since about 30 to 40 years ago, that agriculture is the solution to our problem”.
He said the Trustees of AFAN is seriously looking into the leadership crisis rocking the apex farmers association with a view to resolving it soon to join government in moving the sector forward and restore its glory.
