The production of rice in Nigeria has gained momentum following some policies introduced by the President Muhammadu Buhari administration since it was inaugurated in 2015. SAMSON BENJAMIN, KEHINDE OSASONA, and BENJAMIN UMUTEME, in this report, take a critical look at the gains, challenges, and prospects of federal government’s reforms to enhance increased production of the commodity.
Rice is one of the most consumed staple in Nigeria. It is consumed across households, from low to high income earners. Overtime, this staple food has evolved from being regarded as a luxury dish to being an everyday meal.
Nigeria’s huge potentials
Nigeria is blessed with vast arable land and good climatic conditions that suit rice cultivation. According to the United Kingdom’s Department For International Development (DFID) on growth and development in Nigeria in 2018, Kebbi state is said to be the state with the highest rice production capacity with 2.05 million metric tonnes in the rainy season and 1.51 million tonnes in the dry season.
Apart from having the biggest rice clusters settlement in the country, it also has the biggest paddy market. Kano state trails with the production of 1.6 million metric tonnes annually.
Currently, 18 states are reputed as having huge potentials for rice production in the country. They include Kebbi, Benue, Ebonyi, Ekiti, the Federal Capital Territory, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, and Katsina.
Others are: Lagos, Nasarawa, Taraba, Kogi, Zamfara, Ogun, Niger, Kwara, and Sokoto.
However, in spite of the country’s huge potentials in rice production, figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed that as at 2015, the country spent N356 billion annually in the importation of rice.
Buhari’s reform in rice revolution
Dissatisfied with the narrative in rice production, a crop which Nigeria has comparative advantage over other countries, President Buhari, through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), launched the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP). The programme was launched on November 17, 2015. Its main objective is to create a linkage between anchor companies involved in the processing and smallholder farmers (SHFs) of the required key agricultural commodities.
Speaking at the annual bankers’ dinner held in December, 2018, in Lagos, CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele, said “the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP) has created 2.5 million jobs across the country since its inception.”
Attaining self-sufficiency
Similarly, speaking with Blueprint Weekend, the national president of Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN), Alhaji Aminu Goronyo, said Nigeria had hit annual production of eight million metric tonnes of rice production, with a target of 18 million metric tonnes by 2023.
According to him, this was contrary to the speculation that Nigeria is currently producing a little above four million metric tonnes.
“The production as of today by RIFAN and other relevant agencies record is eight million metric tonnes; even Kebbi alone has hit almost two million metric tonnes if not for the last floods that devastated the farms.
“It has been established by relevant agencies that Nigeria is the largest producer of rice in Africa as the population of rice farmers in the country has also risen. With the ever increasing population and the total ban on rice importation, RIFAN is targeting 18 million tonnes by 2023,” he said.
Goronyo said the feat was achieved with the disbursement of N40 billion by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) under the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (CBN/APB) to over 12.2 million rice farmers.
“In 2018/2019 Wet-season RIFAN/CBN/BOA, Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP) Farming Model in Kebbi and Adamawa states has 26,000 rice farmers, out of the 10 million farmers from 32 states targeted for the project benefited from the pilot project. Under the first phase of the programme, 6,800 hectares of land were cultivated at the cost of N203, 000 per hectare.
“It is a cashless project that provides farmers with the needed farm inputs, which comprise improved seedlings, water pumps, chemicals, and other services like land preparations. Also, under the project, mechanised services were made available to farmers.”
He further said all the participating states under the CBN/ABP had converted their Pilot Programmes into massive production resulting in high cultivation.
Also, Goronyo said with the total ban on rice importation by the government and collaboration with the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between RIFAN and Nigeria Customs Service to tackle the rice and paddy rice smugglers across the borders, more feat would be achieved.
According to him, the association is collaborating with the federal government towards reducing the cost of production aimed at crashing the price of milled rice in the market.
Rice farmers commend Buhari
The chairman, RIFAN Kwara state chapter, Alhaji Abdulahi Mahmud Siddiq, told Blueprint Weekend that farmers in the state are currently feeling the impact of rice revolution in the state, saying that the cashless loan administrated by the CBN via the anchor borrowers’ scheme has led to increase in production and profit.
He said, “The input disbursed to our farmers in form of cashless loan has in a way assisted us in carrying out our annual production. At the end of the season, the loan is usually paid back to RIFAN in kind and cash. After that, RIFAN will now remit to participating finance outfit of which Unity Bank is one of them.
“Government should help to ensure that we get our inputs before June when production usually starts and also help rice farmers by including cash in their loan so as to be able to carry out effectively both pre-planting and post-planting operations without financial hassles.”
Similarly, rice farmers in Nasarawa state who spoke with Blueprint Weekend lauded the efforts of the Buhari-led administration towards the revitalisation of the agriculture sector through the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme.
This comes after beneficiaries of the programme in Gombe state received four bags of fertiliser, a bag of improved variety of rice seeds, water pumps and insecticides.
Speaking on the programme, one of the beneficiaries, Mr Aliyu Ahmadu, said President Buhari’s action has helped farmers by improving their yields during rainy and dry season farming.
According to Ahmadu, this effort by the president will encourage farmers to be more productive, thereby improving their yields.
He added that he had received inputs for three hectares from the government, assuring that he would make good use of it and pay back in time.
Maryam Usman, a female rice farmer, also said the programme “would go a long way in improving the economy of the country.”
Challenges
In spites of efforts by the government to make rice available to Nigerians, local rice is more expensive than the imported rice from Thailand, India, and China.
According to stakeholders in the rice sub sector, there are a lot of international and local forces behind the price disparity between the local and foreign rice.
Some stakeholders maintain that unavailability of farm inputs and consequently low yields per hectare of local rice majorly contributes to the high cost of Nigerian rice.
Others argue that imported rice is sold at auction prices in the importing countries, thereby making the importers to buy the product below international price, which when imported into Nigeria could be sold cheaper than the local rice.
According to the president of Rice Millers Importers and Distributors Association of Nigeria (RiMIDAN,) Mr. Tunji Owoeye, “The biggest challenge is that we don’t understand that rice is an internationally trading commodity, and because of that other countries with which we are competing always try to ensure that we keep buying.”
“Countries, particularly Thailand, India, and china, buy a lot of paddy from their farmers and keep in storage, sometimes as long as nine years, and by so doing, they are supporting their farmers. Their farmers, therefore, do not worry about market, so a country like Thailand may have eight million tonnes of rice in storage. So, occasionally they will auction the ones that are almost going bad and not fit for human consumption because you can use rice for animal feed or ethanol. They auction the rice for that sector, but because it is an export auction, those companies that import rice to Nigeria will go and buy up the commodity.
“Sometimes those auctioned are sold at 20 per cent of the international price of rice; for instance, if rice is $600 per tonne, in April this year, Thailand auctioned 1.62 million tonnes of rice at about $140 per tonne while the market price is about $700 per tonne. So, what that does is that if the importer brings that rice to Nigeria, he is not bringing the rice at international prices, and the local farmers cannot compete with that price and that is why we think that imported rice is cheaper that locally produced rice.
“What other countries have done in order to correct that is that they tell their customs to disregard the price the importer said he imported the rice and use the parameters they have, that is what the customs is supposed to be doing.”
“The customs just relies on what the importer declares; if he says I bought rice for $140 per tonne, they charge him 60 per cent of $140, and he will still bring the rice into Nigeria at about $200. So, the poor Nigerian farmer who is offering rice for $500 will be said to be uncompetitive, whereas if that importer were to buy fresh rice from anywhere, he cannot bring it into Nigeria below $700 per tonne.
“ Local rice is not expensive because we are not comparing it with its equivalent elsewhere, we are comparing it with rice that is auctioned; that is seven to eight years old and there is no way the two can be the same.
“The imported rice does not have the same aroma with that of the locally produced; the imported rice has a white substance which is the preservative”.
High cost of cultivation
Meanwhile, another stakeholder maintained that the cost of cultivating rice in Nigeria is a contributing factor to why the rice is more expensive than the foreign rice.
Dr Rose Gidado, a scientist and the Country Coordinator of the Open Forum On Agricultural Biotechnology (OFAB), in a chat with BlueprintWeekend, said insect and pest infestation as well as soil salinity also contributes to low yields which in return make the local very expensive.
She further said farmers spend more on purchasing farm inputs which may not give them the actual yields per hectare that they require.
“The cultivation of Nigerian rice is more cumbersome, you have to use a lot of farm inputs for you to be able to make something. You need a lot of fertiliser for you to get good harvestable yields, and farming is all about yields.
“These harvestable yields are dependent on several factors, such as soil fertility, insect and pest infestations and harsh weather conditions, like salinity, especially rice which is easily affected by salinity that is the soil that contains much salt.
“For the farmer to make the soil fertile so that a good result will be achieved, he has to purchase the fertiliser, and fertiliser which is an essential commodity for farming is scarce and expensive.
“Other contributing factors include the presence of weed in the farms, once the soil is fertile, it will be overtaken by weed because the nutrient the crop needs is also the nutrient the weed needs to survive.
“So, all these things put together contribute to the Nigerian rice being expensive because the farmers spend much money to put more inputs into the rice farm, and after harvest, they will want to recoup all the money they spent, and trying to do that, the price has to go high.”
In order to increase production, she said the government can adopt new biotechnology which will enhance productivity and help reduce the price of the local rice.
She said, “To come out of this, we have to adopt technologies that help like the use of modern biotechnology tool, genetic modification tool.
“Presently, the Cereal Research Institute of Nigeria is undertaking a project, the Nitrogen-use Efficiency Water-use Efficiency and Salt Tolerance (NEWEST) rice that will really help because the technology that is being adopted for the rice really maximises uptake of the nutrients from the soil; with little fertiliser, the expected yields will be achieved.
“The NEWEST rice allows the farmer to plant where there is high concentration of salt, because the rice has been modified to tolerate salt. It reduces the use of farm inputs, it can be planted where there is little rain because it is Water efficient and also intercrop the rice with other crops, so it has a lot of advantages over the conventional rice.”
Poor technology adoption
Furthermore, the national chairman of the National Association of Grain Storage Practitioners of Nigeria, Chief Eric Ozongwu, said the foreign rice is highly subsidised from the production countries, while ours is not subsidised.
He said the importing countries have better high yielding seeds to produce more than what we have, adding that “the highest we can get here is seven tonnes per hectare, but over there you can get as much as 12 tonnes per hectare. So, with that the price automatically becomes lower.”
“They use a whole lot of mechanisation in rice production, like tractors, harvesters are readily available. But here in Nigeria, we use a whole lot of manual labour, and even when we get the paddy, we don’t have enough milling plants and fertilisers are expensive here compared to those over there.
“What most governments do in developed societies is that they buy off the paddy from the farmers and sell at cheaper prices to encourage the farmers to go back to farm, but in Nigeria, the case is different.
“Like what the CBN is doing presently through the anchor borrowers’ scheme, if they intensify that approach and give facilities to farmers on a very low interest rate because you cannot use commercial bank interest rates to make headway in agriculture.
“So, if it is sustained over the years, it will help to bring the prices of rice down, and the National Seed Council should do a lot by giving us a high-yielding seeds so that we can increase the yields per hectare.”
As it were, Nigeria’s rice situation is peculiar in the sense that rice production is mainly done by a handful of small-scale farmers and producers. Today, the rice sub-sector is still yearning for huge intervention that could put Nigeria on global rice index table.
