Pay Attention To Improving Soil Fertility, Don Tells Governments

Dr Nditoi Idem, the Head of Crop Science Department, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Uyo, has urged governmentto pay more attention to improving soil fertility.

He spoke in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Uyo on Sunday, saying that encouraging appropriate institutions by governments to improve on soil fertility would increase food production.

He advised that applying both organic and inorganic fertiliser to the soil adequately could enrich it and boost production.

Idem, an agronomist, said that organic fertiliser improved the structure of the soil and also helped in retention of inorganic fertiliser.

“So,we need to pay more attention to improving soil fertility and we need to get up and have a government that thinks about farming,’’ he said.

He said that if the government did not take critical steps to improve agricultural production, the country might not be able to feed its teeming population.

“Previously, we used to have land left for fallow between five to seven years and in some places 10 years.

“But now, a number of areas in Akwa Ibom and other parts of the country, farmers do continuous cropping which makes the soil barren,’’ he noted.

He advised the government to make farming attractive and provide incentives, especially to the youth, to boost food production.