“Now listen, the one thing about agriculture is: we may have lost our manufacturing, we’ve lost a great deal of jobs, lots of our industry. But the last thing in the world we need to do is, lose the ability to produce our food” – John Boozman.
As President Buhari continues or Atiku prepares to takeover after Saturday’s polls, I wish to draw attention to the much-talked about national economic diversification by pointing out the agriculture alternative, and how to make it work.
Agriculture is fundamental to the sustenance of life and is the bedrock of economic development, especially in the provision of adequate and nutritious foods for human development and raw materials for industry.
In the 1960s before it turned to oil, Nigeria was one of the most promising agricultural producers in the world. Between 1962 and 1968 export crops were the country’s main foreign exchange earner. The country was number one globally in palm oil exports, well ahead of Malaysia and Indonesia and exported 47 percent of all groundnuts putting it ahead of the U.S and Argentina.
But its status as agricultural powerhouse has declined. While Nigeria once provided 18 per cent of the global production of cocoa, second in the world in the ‘60s, that figure is now down to 8 percent. And while the country produced 65 per cent of tomatoes, it is now the largest importer of tomato pastes.
These statistical data speak volume on why Nigeria was and still is, on the fast lane of economic decadence. The question is, where did we get it wrong? Researchers are unanimous that poor policymaking decisions and indifference on the part of government at all levels are the principal reasons agriculture in the country is in comatose.
Between 1972 and 1985, five agricultural policies were made. These include: National Accelerated Food Production Programme (NAFPP) 1972-1973 (Gowon’s regime); Operation Feed the Nation (OFN) 1976-1980 (Obasanjo’s regime); Green Revolution Programme (GRP) 1981-1983 (Shagari’s regime); Go Back to Land Programme(GBLP) 1983-1985 (Buhari’s regime); Directorate of Food, Road and rural Infrastructure (DFRRI) 1985-1992 (Babangida’s regime).
Furthermore, the federal government in 2004 launched another economic reform,National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS). In the agriculture sector,NEEDS was directed to influence improvement in the provision of subsidy in the production, processing and distribution of agricultural commodities.
Despite these reform policies and programmes, the performance of the sector had not fared any better than it did shortly after independence.
At the return to democracy in May 1999 and shortly before then, several institutional changes were made in order to realise the agriculture policies objectives in line with the belief that agricultural and rural development are sine quo non to improved economic development and to enable the Nigerian agricultural sector respond to the imperatives of the emerging global economic order, these includes National FADAMA projects.
Dear incoming president, agriculture policies fail due to inability of various regimes in power from independence to have a meritocratic system of recruiting the best hands for government jobs thereby furthering the malfunction of agriculture policies. The act of policymaking became the pre-occupation of unskilled and less educated politicians who had little or no knowledge about policy formulations, implementation and evaluation. Again, some government officials were above the law thus aiding gross misconduct and misappropriation of government resources.
Due to the fact that most policymaking process in Nigeria lack technocrats and skilled bureaucrats, technical tools of analysis such as Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) are lacking in the art of policymaking. Government officials are not interested in evaluating the success or otherwise of their policies. Thus, it is no surprise that most of them failed.
The impacts of domestic socio-political factors also played prominent role in the failure of agriculture programmes as conflicts and political violence that transverse the polity trickled down to irregularities in the policies made. The exit of USAID in the ‘80s put a hold on research activities in agriculture sector up to a decade later.
Dear next president, for agriculture sector to thrive in any country there must be in place the appropriate technology to kick-start and consolidate development of crop production and animal husbandry. While various regimes made policy statements to achieve good goals, such as providing food for all Nigerians and for export markets, the technology needed to achieve them was never available. For example, although General Obasanjo’s administration established universities of agriculture and technology, these institutions suffered from inadequate funding occasioned by corrupt practices and lack of mechanised apparatuses that would have developed the local content initiatives and make Nigeria self-sufficient in food production.
Another major blow is the geometrical increase in corruption indices due to lax in the rule of the game as material cum financial resources meant for agriculture found their way into private pockets of politicians and other privileged hands. In short, due process and ideas were ignored in the policy transfer protocols with government officials paying more attention to receiving gratifications.
The inability of various regimes to have appropriate feedback mechanism which would have transformed early agriculture policy failure into a learning point also facilitated avoidable policy failures in the sector.
So whether the days after February 16 become a Buhari continuity or Atiku presidency, it needs reminding that to make policies work and sustainable in Nigeria, it is imperative to consider domestic socio-political conditions while integrating lessons drawn from successful policy systems with home-grown solutions.
Dear Buhari or Atiku, agriculturists, researchers and more importantly the farmers/rural dwellers that are normally ignored during planning and implementation of agricultural/rural development programmes should all be taken on board since they are in a better position to identify the policies and programme that will be tailored to the need of the farmers/masses.
There should be continuity and perpetual implementation of agriculture development policies by government for the impact of the policies to be felt on Nigeria economy. New agriculture policies and programmes should be consistent, work in harmony and closely with state and federal policies and programmes.
Thanks and good luck at the polls.
Ogechukwuwrites writes via
[email protected], 08099062006.
