FACAN insists on more support for agriculture, says it can generate 300,000 dollar monthly

Heritage Bank repr, MsJudgelynOkechuwku, FACAN  Nat. SecrAlh. Akin Gbadamosi, President, Dr. Victor Iyama, Heritage Bank, manager, Mr. Daniel Oniko, Vice Presi, Alh. SherifBalogun, Asst. Exe Secr. Prince P. Bakare, Nat. Pres. Palm oil, Engr. Henry Olatujoye.

The National President, Federation of Agricultural Commodity Association of Nigeria (FACAN) Dr. Victor Iyama has insisted that more political support priority must be given to Agriculture by the Nigeria Government in her pursuit of economic repositioning from crude oil to multi facets economy as the sector could earn three hundred thousand dollars to the country every month. 

Dr. Victor Iyama said that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) must consider its economic credit window support towards increasing accelerated development of non –oil sector with more priority to Agriculture saying all facets of the nation’s economy cannot do anything without agriculture “the shoe you wear is agriculture, the food you eat is agriculture, the tyre of the motor you drive is agriculture, the cloth you have is agriculture, the drug you use has element of agriculture, so tell me which other sector has to be taken very serious more than this sector. Agriculture can generate for this nation $ 300,000 monthly”.

FACAN president speaking to the Secretary General (SG) of Hide and Skin, Mr. Hussaini Salem Ahmead who was briefing him on the outcome of his meeting with permanent secretary of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) said that members of FACAN must be ready to do more in ensuring best agronomy practices of production and processing that would ensure global standard acceptance in the world market saying this shall be part of our contribution to agricultural development. 

The SG, Mr. Hussaini Saleh Ahmead had briefed the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development ( FMARD) Permanent secretary on the way forward of  hide and skin saying there is need for the establishment of collation centre so as to ensure massive collection  from off takers who are from the  leather industry adding the issue of Export Expansion Grants (EEG) was also discussed for the purpose of indigenous companies’ development as many of the foreign investors are just taking the advantages of the incentive to develop themselves back home. 

However, the Vice President, FACAN, Alhaji Sherif  Balogun suggested that more issues have to be considered before any decision can be suggest towards EEG because of its importance to exporters saying sentiment must be put aside when accessing issue like this as many may be disposed to it while some may not thereby clamouring for caution .

However, Dr. Iyama promised that the umbrella commodity association would support the Hide and Skin in its dream to establish a collation centre through getting bank financial support as this should be private sector responsibility and not government. 

The FACAN team was part of private sectors who attended the yesterday’s conference organized by the CBN and Nigerian Export Import Bank (NEXIN) towards achieving a strategy for growing Nigeria’s non-oil exports. 

The CBN governor Mr. Godwin Emefiele’s speech read thus “it is my pleasure to make few remarks at this very important conference on revamping Nigeria’s non oil export and devise strategies to increase its contribution for greater economic growth. As you are aware, export is an essential component in the national income and it has a very important role in supporting the nation’s economy against the backdrop of weak oil prices. It has been observed that, while credit to non-oil export is declining and currently at an average of 0.6% of the total domestic loans to the private sector in the past five years, the domestic credit to the economy has been on the rise.

The low level of export loans has no doubt also contributed to a large extent of the decline in the non-oil export revenue receipts from US$10.53 Billion in 2014 to US$4.39 Billion in 2015. The impact of these developments on the  country’s export growth potentials are quit significant and has become instructive for the stakeholders to dialogue towards evolving responsive strategies that will expand resources for export and its funding programmes on a complimentary basis.

The aim of this 1-Day Stakeholders’ Conference is therefore to foster the greater understanding of the issue constraining our non-oil exports and its sustainability with a view to proffering practical solutions on short term and long term perspective.

While I wish to thank all the stakeholders for taking time to be here today, I implore and encourage you to exhaustively discuss issues that may assist achieving the objectives of the “Strategies for Growing Non-Oil Exports”. I believe it will lead to engendering require action for greater non-oil exports for sustainable economic growth and development in Nigeria.

With the caliber of the resource persons and the broad spectrum representation of stakeholders’ deliberations will assist the Bank to formulate policies geared towards enhancing the growth of non-oil exports. It is expected that the resolutions of this conference will lead to increase in foreign exchange receipts and job creation among others.

 Am pleased to inform the stakeholders gathered here today that the Bank is partnering with NEXIM in her new export them financing initiatives, the Export Rediscounting and Refinancing Facility (RRF) and Non-oil Export Stimulation Facility (ESF).  The modalities on how to access them would be unveiled at this conference”