Action Aid, farmers frown at agric budget cut

A None Governmental Organization called Action Aid together with practicing farmers in the country have berated the declining budgetary allocation to agricultural sector saying the downward review would negatively impacted on the development of the food sufficiency and security.

It is noted that the present administration is being rated by some Nigerians as the best performing government in agriculture compared to other regimes in the past, but Action Aid, Nigeria and other stakeholders seem to take a different views based on declining budgetary allocations to the sector in the past three years.

A recent report on the 2015 agriculture sector budget analysis by Action Aid indicates that budgetary allocation to agriculture fell from 1.7% of the national budget in 2013 to 1.44% in 2014 and further declined to 0.9% in 2015.

The report made available to our reporter by the Food and Agriculture Program Advisor of Action Aid Nigeria, Azubike Nwokoye, stated that “the very low allocations remained consistently meagre, not meeting 10% Maputo Declaration in Malabo on agriculture and food security.”

The report further stressed that annual allocations to agriculture “are insufficient to galvanise growth and development impact intended through ECOWAP/CAADP, the National Agricultural Investment Plan (NAIP) or the current Agricultural Transformation Agenda (ATA).”

It also analysed that from 2011 – 2015 the federal government’s agriculture budget allocations have been less than 2% annually. 2015 allocation, which is a paltry 0.9% as it was stated “makes mockery of the government naming the 2015 budget as a ‘Budget of Transition and Hope”

“The situation is always further exacerbated with low quality of spending in general as well as low budget utilization of yearly allocated budgets across States,” the report maintained.

The report noted that out of the total of N39,151,988,128 budgeted for agriculture in 2015,  total capital budget is just 17.7% (N6,944,000,000), while the total recurrent is 82. 3% (N32,207,988,128). Action Aid described the situation as unacceptable as it means that what gets to support the smallholder farmers who sustain the sector will be ‘quite abysmal’.

Action Aid urged the government to dedicate 10% of the total budget to agriculture especially now that oil prices are falling and give more attention to the smallholder farmers, especially women and youths.

The group also called on the agriculture ministry to create a forum for the participation of smallholder farmers and Civil Society Organizations in the budgetary processes for ‘ownership and in order to also inform articulate priorities’.

Other stakeholders in the agriculture sector including the President of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Architect Kabiru Ibrahim and former President of the Fisheries Society of Nigeria (FISON), Dr. Abba Y. Abdullah, who spoke to our reporter on the issue, maintained that the annual agriculture budget was low and urged the government to comply with the 10% Maputo commitment.