CATTLE DESTROY FARMS, POLLUTE STREAM IN AHABA IMENYI COMMUNITY. · FARMERS DEMAND N10m COMPENSATION . FULANI HERDSMEN ACCUSE COMMUNITY LEADERS OF STEALING COW - By Jacob Aguomba

Farmers in Ahaba Imenyi community in Isikwuato council area of Abia state are demanding a compensation of ten million naira for their farms destroyed by herds of cattle which entered their villages last October, destroyed farms and polluted the Eri Mano stream, their only source of water.

Chief Ernest Kanu, a farmer and chairman of the community’s Elders’ Council told this correspondent during the week that the farmers are particularly worried because most of them had borrowed money to cultivate the farms. “We are now in a quandary as in how to pay back the loans since we have lost the farms to the insensitivity and wickedness of the cattle herdsman. So the farmers have decided to ask for a 10 million naira compensation to off-set the loses we have incurred.
In addition to that, the people of this community are now facing very hard times as their only source of water has been polluted. Yes, the Eri Mano Spring Water is the water we drink and use for sundry purposes but now the Fulani herdsmen has deprived us this precious source of life. Even, now they still consider it more important and proper for them and their cows to go into the stream drink and then pollute the water by defecating and urinating in and around the pool. Isn’t this absurd and inhuman? They did not stop there, when the police blamed them for the destruction which their cows had caused, they turned round to accuse some prominent leaders of the community of stealing one of their cows. Can you imagine your guest becoming a pain in your neck?”

But when asked how a normal interaction before now become this sour?

Chief Kanu’s answer is quite an instructive narrative: “You see, we have always had the Fulani herdsmen and their cattle coming and going, in and out of season. The previous generation of herdsmen respected our rights to own farms in our land and we never disturbed them when they took their cattle to the fallow sections of the lands to graze. But this time, one Alhaji Yussuf is the new leader of the herdsmen and he has refused to draw a line between cultivated farms and empty lands. For him, it does not make a difference that his cows invade farms, trample upon newly germinating crops or eat up a whole field of cassava, yams and all manner of vegetables.

To add salt to the festering injury, Alhaji Yussuf and his co-travelers has decided to abuse the privilege of using the pool of water from the only stream within the reach of the inhabitants of this community. He has refused to engage us in discussion to find an alternative way to provide water for his cows. There is no way a cow and human beings could drink from the same cup. Again, for deliberately destroying our farms, we had to call in the police who after visiting the farms and seeing the extent of damage done, blamed the herdsmen and we had to beg angry youths from retaliating in like manner; they listened but the Fulani herdsmen did not conform with the terms of settlement collectively reached with the police authorities. Instead, they have continued to conduct themselves in manners that can only provoke crisis. All these were issues of mid last year. But on October 10, 2014, Alhaji Yussuf and his herdsmen, again strayed into the rest of our farms, destroying our means of livelihood so that theirs may prosper. I think it is a calculated act of provocation; otherwise the cows could conveniently be grazed in the bush instead of cultivated farms.

To top up the embarrassment, the herdsmen has taken over the spring water to the point that women and young girls are harassed whenever thy come to the stream to fetch water. It was after the onslaught of last October that we decided to get our lawyer to put up a petition to the commissioner of police at Zone 9, Ehimiri, and Umuahia to complain against these incessant acts of intimidation, trespass and threats to life which are all calculated to cause a breach of peace. But ironically, what we saw next was a summons to appear in a court at the premises of the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) on January 28. It was addressed to our community chairman Mr. Kalu Okorie, Mr. Achie Ikea and Mr. Chima Orunta, vice chairman and youth leader respectively. They are being accused of stealing a cow purportedly belonging to Alhaji Yussuf.

This reporter could not find neither Alhaji Yussuf nor the herdsmen to get their response as they are said not to have a fixed address. It is noteworthy however, that the government in Abia state had earlier in 2013 set up an ad hoc court at the state SCID to settle the numerous and incessant cases between farmers and Fulani cattle herdsmen; these cases had often arisen from the unwholesome manner of untamed cows which frequently run out of the control of the herdsmen. 

AVIAN INFLUENZA KILLS ONE MILLION BIRDS- FEDERAL GOVT. DOLES OUT N145m IN ASSIST By Jacob Aguomba.

The first few weeks of 2015 came with a big challenge for agripreneurs. Poultry farm workers and several members of the farmers/investors communities are now counting their losses over the latest outbreak of the bird-killer virus, widely known as Avian Influenza. The pandemic, according to industry watchers, has claimed over one million birds in poultry farms across the country starting from Kano and Lagos states just as the Federal government has promised succor of N145 million naira to affected farmers.

While poultry farmers in Abia, Rivers, Imo and Bayelsa states are battling with the new out-break of the dreaded bird flu epidemic, reports from Lagos have also confirmed that many poultry farms have already been ravaged by the new influx of the epidemic with the Northern parts of the country not being spared as bird flu reportedly killed their thousands of chickens.

The Lagos state was promptly to attend to the issue as the Commissioner for Agriculture and Cooperatives, Prince Gbolahan Lawal in a press conference held on 16^th, January confirmed the incidence of high death of birds in the state with proof of positive test from National Veterinary Research Institute in VOM,  attesting to the symptoms of H5 strain of the Avian influenza, but added curtainment is already  in place through collaboration with the health ministry, Lagos chapter, National Poultry Association, National Agricultural Insurance Corporation (NAIC), and birds sellers association in order to stop the spread.

Also on Tuesday January 20, the Rivers state government, in a statement, acknowledged the outbreak of bird flu in the state. The disease had attacked several private and state-run poultry farms in the state. The statement also advised the owners of affected farms to quickly adopt rescue measures to salvage whatever is left of their farms while those whose farms are not yet affected should immediately deploy standard preventive procedures to protect their poultries. 

Speaking to Food and Farm News during the week, a veterinary doctor, Prince C. Igwe, described Bird Flu as a contagious disease that attack poultry farms especially old set-ups that are invariably due for retooling. “It is usually an epidemic that is preventable and farm owners could adopt protective measures which may include the administration of antibiotic drugs on the birds and or the use of disinfectants to cleanse and sanitize their farms”.

Dr. Igwe also alerted farmers to the even more dangerous dimension of the effect of bird flu on human beings. “Let people know that they should also protect themselves from the side effects of the disease. Farm owners or attendants should wash their hands thoroughly with soap immediately after working in the farms or after each close contact.” The Vet further advised farmers to visit Veterinary offices, whether governments run or private to seek advice and buy the appropriate antibiotic drugs to protect their birds.

Meanwhile the Abia state chairman of All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Chief Donlop Okoro has called on the government of Chief Theodore Orji to assist poultry farmers in the state to save their birds to prevent huge losses which the new outbreak of bird flu portends. Chief Okoro said AFAN has set up a sensitization desk at its head office in Umuahia to advise farmers on the standard protection measures necessary to protect their investments in the poultry sub sector. “The state government should step in immediately to help contain the epidemic to avoid a situation where farmers in the state may relapse into extreme poverty which had been their lot before the advent of the federal inspired Growth Enhancement Support (GES) scheme”. 

The federal ministry of agriculture, on January 21 released a statement which implied that there were minor incidences of bird flu in some parts of the country and that measures were being taken to contain the outbreak. However, the minister of agriculture and rural development Dr. Akinwumi Adesina told a meeting of state agriculture commissioners and other stakeholders in Abuja last week that the federal government would compensate 39 poultry farms in 11 states with N145.45 million at N1, 450.00 per bird. The 39 farms in the scheduled list for compensation are in Kano, Gombe, Plateau, Jigawa, Ogun, Imo, Oyo, Rivers, Delta and Edo states.  

In Aba, the Enyimba City whose environs is famous as the food basket of Abia and some neighboring states, the epidemic has already taken a large toll on the fortunes of poultry farmers. Mrs. Grace Adindu, a poultry farmer told Food and Farm News in tears last Tuesday that she had lost a third of her 2000 birds before she realized the problem was actually an epidemic. Asked how she finally found that the birds were dying of bird flu, Mrs. Adindu said, “We have this circle of friends who invested monies borrowed from our small scale thrift and cooperative society. 

We meet on regular dates to exchange ideas and monitor the progress and discuss progress or whatever difficulties that arise in the business. These regular meetings are very important as many of us were going into poultry for the first time. It was during one of these meetings that I reported the frequent death of my birds and I was advised to call our veterinary doctor. He came a week after my call; he had been out of town but by the time he came around, most of the birds had been destroyed and his diagnosis confirmed what we had all suspected. My birds were just three months old. And now this Avian Influenza has set me back seriously. The real headache is that I don’t know how I can pay back the loan”. She is not alone in this quagmire as she confirms, following a question, “Yes, several members of our group suffered similar losses and it’s all very painful.”

Master bakers decry protest over N22.2b cassava bread fund.

The recent protest by members of the Lagos State Chapter of the Nigerian Master Bakers Association over disbursement of the N22.2 billion cassava bread fund has been condemned by the Nigerian Masters Bakers Association, describing it as “politically motivated and mischievous.”

Earlier at a meeting in Lagos, the bakers led by Prince Jacob Adejorin, who is the State Chapter Chairman, faulted federal government’s disbursement process by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) through and the Bank of Industry (BOI) and called for a review.

But in a swift reaction to the protest, the National Chairman of the Association, Sir Simeon Abanulo, at a press briefing in Abuja, attended by other executive members from various chapters, told journalists that “I was surprised to see some bakers from Lagos carrying placards, this is mischief and this is not the time to play politics with food security. We cannot sit down and see some of our members give false information.”

According to the National Chairman, “Over 2,000 bakers have been trained, 171 beneficiaries of the fund have been approved, 96 have benefitted, while the rest are yet to receive due to delay by BOI, which has promised to deliver in the next one week.”
He continued, “Four bakers benefitted in Lagos. We have four beneficiaries in every state. The Chairman of Lagos State Chapter is a beneficiary. If you go to his bakery today, you will see the equipment. He said money given to each baker is too much. It’s not, we are managing it.

Justifying the N14m given to each beneficiary, Sir Abanulo, explained that rotary oven alone costs N7m, while spiral mixer is sold for about N2.5m, and when you add the cost of deep freezer and generator, the N14m will have been exhausted. “A lot of people that carried placards are beneficiaries of the equipment. I don’t know what they want to achieve. I think they are mercenaries,” he noted. 

Also reacting to the protest, the Technical Adviser, Cassava Value Chain, Office of the Minister of Agriculture, Mrs. Oluwatoyin M. Adetunji, told newsmen that the Lagos State Chapter of the association should have considered addressing the issue from the BOI and their national association angles instead of attacking government policy that has good intention.

She, however, pointed out that disbursement of the fund was slow as there are some BOI conditionalities the bakers observed as too rigid adding. “The bank should do its due diligence. But if approval of 171 is given and 96 disbursed, and then something is wrong, may be the process,”

FG doesn’t want farmers to lose – Dr. Olumeko-by Ahmed Agbo

 Dr. Jide Olumeko is the Director, Strategic Grains Reserve Department of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. In this interview, he told Food Farm News that the Federal government is making concerted efforts to ensure that Nigerian farmers do not sell at a loss. He said grain aggregation centres will be set up across the country to mop up excess farm produce.

Could you please tell us the capacity of the silos you have across the country?

The total storage capacity of all the 33 silos complexes that we have in Nigeria now is 1.36 million metric tonnes.

  

What quantity of food do you have in the reserve presently?

Well, for strategic and security reasons, I will only be able to give you the types of food but not the quantity. But I can assure you that we have sizeable quantity in the reserve for Nigeria. We have seven commodities, six are in reserve, the seventh one we have just announced the Guaranteed Minimum Price (GMP) for it. We have maize, we have paddy rice, we have sorghum, we have millet, we have soyabeans, and we have gari also. But the National Committee on Guaranteed Minimum Price has just announced the GMP for High Quality Cassava Flour (HQCF). High Quality Cassava Flour is not in the reserve because it has just been listed and is an industrial product to be used by the flour millers. So, it is meant for production of composite flour in Nigeria.

Where exactly are the silos located?

We have 33 of them like I said earlier. Under phase one (1), we have them in 12 states namely; Kaduna, Ebonyi, Jigawa, Gombe, Edo, Niger, Benue, Oyo, Kwara, Plateau, Cross River and Ondo. The second phase, we have them in 20 states; Katsina, Osun, Adamawa, Sokoto, Kebbi, Kogi, Bauchi, Taraba, Borno and Abuja the FCT. Other states are Yobe, Zamfara, Kano, Nasarawa, Anambra, Imo, Akwa-Ibom, Bayelsa, Ogun and Ekiti.

In phase two (2) they are at various stages of completion. Out of the 20, we have completed nine and commissioned one. Eight are waiting for commissioning. So, the remaining 11 are at different stages of completion.

Rice farmers in some parts of the country, especially in the Northern states where the federal government encouraged them to plant rice last year are complaining that they can’t get buyers, what can you say about that?

Yes, I will say under the GES we encouraged farmers to plant rice. We have two farming seasons now in Nigeria. Before, we were only depending on wet farming season, but now with the current minister’s intervention, we have two planting seasons; the wet and the dry farming seasons. So, during the dry season we were able to produce a lot of rice as you have rightly mentioned. But the Honourable Minister has directed that we should mop up the excess paddy in the country and we have purchased about 15,000 metric tonnes in our silos complex in Sokoto. We have dedicated the silos complex in Sokoto for mopping up of paddy rice in the country. It’s an ongoing exercise. We will still continue to mop up the paddy rice. The minister doesn’t want our farmers to lose. We want our farmers to have appreciable profit from their sales. So, he has directed us to buy the excess at the guaranteed minimum price.

When did you buy the paddy rice?

We just concluded the first purchases about two months ago. The dry season farming is on and by April or May when we have the harvest; we will be able to buy again. Initially we don’t go to the market to buy directly. We have to allow the large scale integrated millers to buy first. So, when we have excess, that is when we will now move to the market to mop it up from the farmers.

The feelers we have indicate that many rice farmers may abandon their farms this year as a result of poor market; I don’t know if your purchases are making the desired impact?

Well, apart from the mopping up we are doing now, we also have another programme which we call Grains Aggregation Centres. We are proposing to have 56 of them in the country. We are starting within the next one month. The purpose is to buy grains from the farmers. Government is not going to run them. It’s going to be private sector led, government is to provide enabling environment for the private sector to operate. We are going to establish the centres in rice producing areas. A farmer will not have to travel more than 10 kilometres to get to the centre where the paddy rice will be bought. At the aggregation centres, we will have complete sets of equipment for cleaning, drying and bagging. We will also have records of farmers that have brought the grains. The idea is just for us to map the farmers under the GES programme that we are running and for them to know where they will sell their produce. I will say may be in about six to seven months from now, the word glut may likely not exist again because the farmers have where to sell. The large scale integrated millers will now have where to buy their paddy rice from.

Have you started creating awareness about the programme?

Yes we have started. People from the private sector that are interested in running them have already expressed interest. By the time we complete, I believe within the next six to eight weeks, they will be operational and we will be able to purchase the grains from the farmers and aggregate the grains and bring them to the required standard and the right quality that the millers want.

There is this issue of rice self-sufficiency and ban on importation of rice earlier targeted at 2015 and we are already in the year 2015, do you think the federal government can achieve that target? 

You know in the earlier discussion you made mention of glut, that means our farmers are producing paddy rice. I will say that there is still a shortfall, but the government is trying all its best to ensure that the shortfall is met by our local farmers. I can assure you that by the end of the year that shortfall will be probably reduced to a minimal figure that we can manage. But I know we are producing and we will produce enough to feed this country especially with the FARO 44 and FARO 52 long grain new varieties of rice that have been introduced.

On a Radio Nigeria programme known as ‘Politics Nationwide’ the agriculture minister recently said Nigeria will be rice self-sufficient and export rice to other countries in the next three years, why are they shifting the rice self-sufficiency target from 2015?

No. we are not shifting it. We have our own data; we have the list of farmers that we are supporting. The minister has a master plan on how to exit importation of rice by this country and he is following up his programme religiously. I will say initially we had the plan of producing enough this year, but as you know we are trying to meet that target. I think what the minister said is that in three years’ time we will be exporting rice to other countries. I think within the next one year or thereabout we should be self-sufficient in rice production. After that, the next stage is for us to export rice to other countries.

You earlier mentioned High Quality Cassava Flour as one of your mandate commodities and bakers have since been directed to include about 20% of it in bread, are you sure there is cassava bread in the market?   

Yes, I will tell you that even every bag of flour that you have in the country now has a quantity of cassava flour in them. The minister also has a programme where they are training bakers on how to produce cassava bread. They have trained them in all the states and I can assure you that all those master bakers are producing cassava bread in the country. If you go to Shoprite you will see cassava bread. Apart from Shoprite other major shops in the country have cassava bread on their shelves.       

The President recently announced that N26 billion will be released for this year’s dry season farming, but the dry season is far spent, if the money is released will it meet the desired objective?

Whatever the President says he is going to fulfill it. The President made the pronouncement at the agric festival that we just had and we have started dry season farming. We have started with four crops. The dry season farming programme is on and we will be able to meet the objectives. So, I will say, Mr. President, what he has pronounced he will do. The government is so concerned about farmers; we want our farmers to become millionaires like farmers in other countries.

Gess delisted seed companies thanking God.

There are indications that the 3 delisted seed companies from the Federal Government’ Growth Enhancement Scheme (GES) of certified seeds distribution may have been having course to thank God as our sources revealed that affected people have resorted to aggressive marketing of their products to end users who are farmers just as payment are immediately made without any delay as compared to GES where many are still expecting the last year payment.

The three companies deleted in 2014 by the minister’s directive due to delivery of sub standard seeds to farmers in their allotted locations may have toed the line of aggressive marketing of their certified seed to farmers which according to our findings has made them to be popular among rural farmers, who are major end users.

A source in the ministry who prefers anonymity told us that what the three companies are doing is exactly where the government is taking the sector where seeds companies will created market mechanism for themselves to get to farmers thereby commending the courage and effort of  the three companies which he regarded as being courageous ones saying” the three of them have started keying into government’s thinking of allowing the private sector doing the seeds business of buying and selling while government should concentrate on friendly policy creation”
 Food Farm News confirmed that some of the farmers who could not benefit from the GES and those who benefited, but the quantity they got were not enough had to resort to these companies who are aggressively taking their products to the door steps of the farmers.

It will be noted that the purpose of the Growth Enhancement Scheme was to ensure that farmers are using improved technology of certified seeds to plant and also to make producers of certified seeds to build marketing structure in terms of agro-dealers that will take these inputs to the farmers, thereby creating more jobs at this value chain and making Agro-shops be at every villages where farming activities is going on.
 Some of the officials of these companies who spoke in anonymity said that although they are not initially happy for being delisted from the GES, saying they see their participation as a National calling, but added that whatever has transpired was not intentional, stressed the need for Agro-dealers’ supply nearer to ecological areas of farming activities as this would also checkmate the losing of the seeds potency to long distance stress cum delay in off taking.

One of the staffs of the affected companies argued that” ‘’many reasons presented against us may not totally be our fault as I am sure the minister was not properly briefed of what went wrong. The action has motivated us into aggressive marketing which turns out to be a blessing since we are only delisted from participating in the GES but not in our normal operation as a registered companies and that is why we are thanking God because we also have stock to supply to farmers at demand unlike before when we will give our products to GES without payment while bank interest rate will be running on our expenses. And the efficacy of our products to farmers is already making us to be popular among the end users across the states. But I really commend the Minister of Agriculture of his doggedness in fixing agriculture as a business in Nigeria and this is already working in the seed sector”.

In a similar development the West Africa Agricultural Productivity Programme (WAAPP) has said that about 6 tons of rice seeds (0.8 tons of Faro 52 breeder seed, 3.1 tons of Faro 52 and 2.1 tons of Faro 57 foundational seeds which was produced in 2013 have got germination reduction rate of 40 to 70% which according to 2014 bulletin was due to late takeoff by NASC thereby advising the need to take urgent attention to prevent further damage to the seeds.

Editorial- Need to properly position NACGRAB in the appropriate ministry

The National Centre for Genetic Resources and Biotechnology (NACGRAB) under the Federal Ministry of Science and Technology has a very strategic role in the conservation and sustainable utilization of genetic animals and plant crops for proper census of all the registered varieties that go out to the farmers being the custodian of the genetic characters and history strains of all seeds for agricultural economic development.

It is obvious that the role of this Centre is more conspicuous in the agricultural sector than the ministry where is presently domiciled which to many stakeholders have been seen to be wrongly placed considering the enormity of the role it has to play in the agricultural sector especially in the face of proper record of genetic, character and history of agricultural produce in the country.

At the last meeting of National committee on Naming, Registration and Release of crops, livestock and fisheries varieties held in December 2014, some of the major issues pointed to the fact that NACGRAB would have better performed in the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development based on the fact that majority of its mandate function and affiliated agencies are in the same place. Although we are not ignorant of the fact that the Centre is also a science based Institute especially in the face of biotechnology practice in the world which is yet to be signed into law in Nigeria for official operation, but we cannot also run away from the fact that the centre may have performed better if properly placed where it will be well supported financially for national development, otherwise its establishment by being wrongly placed may not worth the salt.

It is obvious from point of argument of stakeholders that this misplacement may have hindered more of its responsibility mandates especially in agencies affiliation which we are of the view must not be allowed to continue especially in the face of most nations of the world now giving prominent to its agricultural development in terms of ensuring the record of seeds genetic character and history of both crops and animals that entered their countries thereby checkmating influx of diseases as well as sub standard.

Scientists from various citadels of learning and agencies in the agricultural sector including the private sector in the course of brainstorming for better performance of the Centre had suggested the movement of this Centre to the federal Ministry of agricultural saying that the appropriation will enhance its performance in terms of righty affiliation with other agencies like NAQS so as to ensure more efficiency and better performance  to Federal Government’s agricultural programme of food security and wealth creation with employment generation.

In the face of doing things differently and rightly in this country, all mechanism must be put in place by ensuring that agencies, parastastal, and centers like NACGRAB are properly positioned in a way that will ensure it effectiveness especially in the keeping of animals’ genetic characters and strains so as to checkmate many of them going into extinction and more so that many of the private sector are not willingly ready to release their strain due to lack of effective property right in the country which stakeholders pointed that the minister of Agric, Dr. Adesina is vigorously pursuing towards  winning the confidence of the multi nationals in the development of agriculture in Nigeria.

For the purpose of posterity of our future agricultural development with dwindling of crude oil in the world market and its impact already biting , we are of the view that government must not lag in its spirit of agency rationalization to ensure that NACGRAB is properly placed in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development where majority of its working partners like IITA, NARIs, Farmers, ICRISAT, Rice Africa, NAQS, NASC, WAAPP and Seeds Companies can be easily accessed for better service delivery and funding through agricultural research grants thereby becoming more active and relevant in contributing to the development of agriculture and food security in the county.