………Urged President Bola Tinubu to urgently take measures to address food insecurity in Nigeria
By Fatima Saka
The Nigeria Senate has revealed that Federal government of Nigeria have released 60 trucks of fertilizer across the federation to be distributed to farmers in order to caution the effects of food insecurity in the country.
Godswill Akpabio, the president of the Senate, cautions that individuals and politicians should not odd the fertilizer nor take glory, in respect of political parties.
This follows the announcement on Tuesday by the Senate President, as informed by Committee Chairman on Agriculture and Rural Department, Saliu Mustapha, Sequel to the motion sponsored by Senator Karimi, Sunday Steve, representing Kogi West Senatorial District, and co-sponsored, Senator Ndume, Mohammed Ali, representative of Borno South senatorial district.
The motion titled: “Urgent Need to address Food Insecurity and Market Exploitation of Consumables in Nigeria.”
According to the senator representing Kogi West, that in the last few months, the price of goods and household consumables have been on an abysmal rise in the country, leading to a high rate of inflation, weakened buying power, and general worsening of living conditions of vast majority of Nigerians:
He further noted that the latest data by Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics shows that food inflation in the country skyrocketed to 40.66 percent in a year-on-year basis, a significant increase from the 24.82 percent recorded in May 2023:
He lamented that current market price of food items such as beans, maize, rice paddy, yam, tomatoes, and onions which initially rose by about 40% after the removal of petroleum Subsidy has now increased to over 100% 10 300% without any attributable reason for the increase in prices
Senator Karimi further stressed that aware that although insecurity in food-producing regions, had roads, increase in the cost of transportation attributable to the removal of fuel subsidy and depreciation of the value of Naira, are possible Factors that have contributed to the increase in price of Food items, Household Commodities, and Consumables; the percentage of increase in cost of transportation and son under factors listed above, is significantly less than the percentage increase in the current prices of goods all over the country,
He said “concerned that the greater percentage of the increase in prices of food items and consumables in the Country is not only due to these factors but to the zest of the merchants, traders, and retailers to make supernormal profits whilst they excuse the hike in price on these factors (depreciation of the Naita against the Dollar, Increase in price of Petroleum Products due to Fuel price increase and insecurity in farming Regions), thereby heaping all the blame on the Federal Government
“Notes that there is a general attitude of “Get Rich Quickly” or “Get Rich By All Means” leading many Nigerians to jettison “being their brother’s keeper” and exploiting one another to make abnormal profits: This attitude has been justified on the basis that many members of the Political Class, Technocrats, and Corporate Elites have helped themselves with Public Funds without any repercussions in Law, Nigerian Traders have thus resorted to Price Gouging to maximize profits:
“Notes that there are reports that Farming Communities in the Border Regions with other Countries, prefer to sell their food items abroad (to these neighboring countries), rather than domestically(to the hinterland), thereby increasing local food insecurity.”
He concluded that all efforts made by the current Federal Executive to arrest the consistent increase in food inflation have not yielded the desired results, there is need to be more pragmatic about addressing food insecurity, curbing herder farmer crises, kidnapping for ransom, and Terrorism, and ensure the development of a viable National Commodity Board to regulate the price of grains and ensure the elimination of artificial contributions to food and commodity inflation in Nigeria.”
However, the senate further resolute by urging President Bola Tinubu to urgently take measures to address food insecurity in Nigeria
