Prof. Danbala Danja |
The Managing
Director of the Bank of Agriculture (BOA) Prof. Danbala Danja has said that the
devaluation of Nigerian currency would enhance economic activities at the grassroots
as agricultural produce will be more exportable thereby enhance micro economic
activities at the rural areas just as he hinted a plan towards mechanized farming
in about ten pilot states using irrigation technologies.
At Abuja in
an agricultural conference, Prof. Danbala argued that the naira being over
valued may not be of any help to agricultural development especially at the rural
areas saying it would only allow the importers to keep flooding the countries
with foreign materials at the expense of local production as high exchange rate
may not favour agricultural export markets.
Although the
BOA boss submitted that the devaluation policy may not be friendly to importers
but argued that the micro economic advantages would attract wealth creation at
the rural areas more than the disadvantages especially in the development of
agriculture in Nigeria.
Prof. Danja
pointed that in an effort to make agriculture enterprises our monetary policy
must be in favour of local production regardless of elites’ thinking stressed
that the devaluation of naira would checkmate people’ movement into the urban
centres searching for scarce white collar jobs occasioned by scarce economic activities
at the rural areas.
In his
argument on stimulating micro economy of agricultural activities with monetary
policy, he said that “micro economies instability particularly with the current
monetary policy of exchange rate as the devaluation of the naira seems to be a
controversial issue. Now the reality is that from the point of view of
agricultural producers, devaluation is good because it makes export cheaper as
it will create an avenue for domestic producers to increase local production
while import will be expensive. I know there are economists around, but I know
the devaluation of naira is going to be good for agricultural producers. If you
talk about import of fertilizers or tractors, you must also think in terms of domestic
market availability because an overvalued naira is not in the interest of
agriculture as it encourages people in the rural areas to keep leaving for the
urban centres due to income stagnation to trade is against agricultural
development. Nigeria has an overvalued exchange rate; it is time to be
corrected. Of course importers will not be happy with that and elites also will
not be happy as they say it is inflationary. It is inflationary only if you
have the inconsistence monetary and fiscal policies”.
He emphasized
the need for making agriculture more of business through modern ways of
practicing farming in all the seasons adding that his bank was already working
on a pilot project in about 10 states where all year round agriculture will be
practiced in more loanable ways.
“There is
one particular project which the bank of Agriculture is proposing. This idea of
making agriculture 365 days a year through identification of water bodies like
dams or conversed reservoirs for the purpose of both dry and wet season through
rotational crops in order words during the dry season you can produce cotton,
and during raining season you produce soya beans. We are proposing this
importantly for the youth’s engagement in the sector because agriculture should
not only depend on rain, there should be injection of irrigation technology
that will be tied to community projects which will be piloted in about 10
states. The cost implication will be affordable for the involvement of many
farmers. We are starting with ten states as we can turn Sahara to into a green
land environment where all year cultivation can be done as long as there is
political will with resources made available with monitoring and evaluation”
said BOA boss.
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