The National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) and the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security have strengthened their partnership to ensure that government agricultural interventions reach genuine farmers through robust digital identity verification, in a move aimed at boosting food security and eliminating leakages in the distribution of farm support.

The commitment was made on Thursday during a meeting between the Director-General of NIMC, Engr. Abisoye Coker-Odusote, and the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, in Abuja.

The collaboration will leverage the National Identification Number (NIN) and NIMC’s identity verification platform to authenticate beneficiaries of government agricultural programmes, ensuring that interventions are targeted at legitimate farmers and agribusiness entrepreneurs.

Speaking during the meeting, Kyari said the ministry had already begun deploying NIMC’s identity management infrastructure to identify genuine beneficiaries of its intervention programmes, noting that the initiative had improved transparency and contributed to increased youth participation in agriculture over the past three years.

He also disclosed that the Federal Government was restructuring its agricultural subsidy programme to promote self-reliance among beneficiaries instead of long-term dependence on government support.

“It shouldn’t be a subsidy that will go on perpetually. We have a plan whereby beneficiaries receive support in the first year, the assistance reduces in the second year, and by the third year they should be able to stand on their own,” the minister said.

According to him, the phased approach will create opportunities for more farmers to access government interventions while encouraging sustainable agricultural production and improved productivity.

Responding, Coker-Odusote described agriculture as one of Nigeria’s most strategic sectors because of its critical role in ensuring national food security and driving economic development.

She assured the ministry of NIMC’s continued support in providing trusted identity verification services to strengthen the credibility of government agricultural interventions.

The NIMC Director-General said the recently enacted NIMC Act 2026 has further strengthened the commission’s mandate as Nigeria’s foundational identity authority, positioning it to support ministries, departments and agencies with secure identity verification and digital authentication services.

She noted that integrating the National Identification Number into agricultural programmes would improve accountability, reduce fraud and eliminate ghost beneficiaries, while ensuring that scarce public resources are directed to the farmers who genuinely need them.

Coker-Odusote added that stronger collaboration between NIMC and the Ministry of Agriculture would also support the Federal Government’s broader digital transformation agenda by using trusted identity systems to improve public service delivery and enhance the effectiveness of social and economic interventions.

The partnership is expected to deepen the use of digital identity across Nigeria’s agricultural value chain, improve planning and monitoring of intervention programmes, and reinforce ongoing efforts to achieve sustainable food security under the Renewed Hope Agenda.