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Ogbeh Unveils Plan To Diversify Agric Sector

By Segun Olaniyi, Abuja
07 February 2016   |   2:44 am
The Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh has outlined ways by which the Federal Government can diversify from oil to non-oil sector anchoring it on the agric sector.
Lagos State Bird processing centre at Ikorodu putting more meat on the table…if sustained, states embarking on projects like this would create jobs and feed the people

Lagos State Bird processing centre at Ikorodu putting more meat on the table…if sustained, states embarking on projects like this would create jobs and feed the people

The Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh has outlined ways by which the Federal Government can diversify from oil to non-oil sector anchoring it on the agric sector.

Ogbeh said the policy thrust of the 2016 budget are for the diversification from oil to non-oil sector of the economy, which would create jobs, expand of agricultural commodity value chains, establish staple crop processing zones and promote agricultural investments in other to attract more direct foreign investments.

Speaking at a joint budget defence committee on Agricultural and Rural Development in Abuja, he said the total 2016 budget proposal is N40,918,856,927 made up of N34,501,127,211 representing 84 per cent of total proposal for capital projects, N235,259,192 representing 0.6 per cent of total proposal for overhead costs and N6,182,470,524 representing 15 per cent of total proposal for personnel costs.

He said the ministry is projecting an Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) of N904,739,098.69 for 2016 fiscal year, adding that N664,998,569.88 is for taxes and N239,740,528.81 as Independent Revenue.

“The key initiatives for the fiscal year in the agricultural sub-sector are to increase the national food supply and to address national food security. To add 20 million metric tonnes of food annually and to create three million sustainable jobs annually.”

According to him, the ministry will continue the Growth Enhancement Support (GES) programme as a platform to deliver inputs like fertilisers, seeds and agro-chemicals to small-holder farmers, stressing that the ministry would concentrate on critical projects and programmes, such as import substitution commodity value chains, export substitution commodity value chains, labour intensive family enterprise (LIFE) programmes, agriculture mechanisation and grazing reserves/stock routes development

2 Comments

  • Author’s gravatar

    Agriculture is the fastest and best means for Nigeria to dig itself out of the hole. it has the ability to generate huge revenue, to employ millions of Nigeria, reduce our forex demand and increase export. We need state governor, ministers and MDA to focus massively on agriculture and it value change. To stabilize the naira, we need to earn more forex, or reduce our demand. since earning more foreign currency is much harder, agriculture give us the ability within a short time to reduce our food importation, hence reducing our forex demand. All hands must be on deck. we need to encourage farming and raising animals across the board. From educational center, to corporate houses, private homes and even government agency. everyone has to be somehow involved in the production of food or the processing of food.

  • Author’s gravatar

    Two things that will lead us as a people out of the doldrums agriculture-wise are technology and economics. What is glaringly missing in the spending plans is that technology is not adequately planned for in this spending plan. The world tells us that we are starting a New Industrial Revolution from this year, but our agricultural spending plans are not technologically skewed. This is a tragedy. The criticisms have gone on to the highest levels of government especially in the misplacement of agricultural planning, but no body in the government is bold enough to say, you know what we goofed, we need to look at this again. Using technology will allow us ask ourselves whether there are no realistic alternatives to the expensive chemical fertilizers we buy? There are cheaper and low level technological alternatives. What about ethanol blending that is needed for PMS? We need more planning. This is not to say that the team is not on point, but obviously, the funds allocated don’t seem geared at improving agriculture in the quantum leaps that the nation now requires. The budget for agriculture in the universe of priorities should not have been less than !0% of the entire budget or N600b rather than a paltry 0.5% allocated. Are we not jocking?