BOA MD Advocates Naira devaluation, says farmers will benefit more, opens plans on irrigation farming

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.