Stories by John Oba
Abuja
The federal government has stated that it would expand the scope of activities of the West African Agricultural Productivity Programme (WAAPP) Nigeria has the government has applied for the second phase due to commence soon.
The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh stated this at the weekend when he visited Longa-Ewa Lakes farmer, at Sabo-Wuse, in Niger state.
He said: “We have applied for the continuation of WAAPP and we believe the programme will resume again in full force and increase supports to organisations like this.
Once will finish discussion with the world bank, activities will continue on the increase, we need more and more of this in the country. The country is big and those will to produce this things are very many now, definitely we will pursue the second phase,” he said.
Commending the effort of the executive chairman of the company, Mr. Njidda Ahmed, saying the government is working to help companies like his.
“I admire what he has done, because I know how difficult it is to run a farm or agro-industrial outfits in this country, especially, using stainless steel like he is doing here is not cheap and then the usual problem with credits in this country and the interest rate. So I really commend his endurance.
“The government will bring down interest rate on all agriculture lending, and we just talked about training of agro rangers, who will ensure that he is able to keep his cow and beginning to supply his own milk instead of the use of powder milk.
“We will see how to engage in making policies to ensure that those investing in agric do it without hindrance. Most countries in the world have low rate credits for agric, if we don’t have that, we may not be able to feed ourselves,” he said.
Also speaking Mr. Ahmed said the challenged the company is faced with is electricity. While calling for the stopping of importation of concentrates, as it hinders manufacturing in Nigeria.
Saying: “Electricity is my major, major challenge, if there is electricity today, right now we would have been working because of lack of light I had to divide the staff into two section, since there are light in the night at times, so we use the light in the night for some time, but most of the time there is not light.
“The more this is allowed allow importation of concentrates, employment is being created for those in the country of origin and this is not helpful to the economic.”
He said restructuring of the Bank of Agriculture is not enough but government must ensure that those truly in need of fund for agricultural purposes should be given.
“Commercial banks would be asking of tangible assets and it is not everyone that her asset in choice area to give. Why can’t they take lien on the floating asset of the company?
“We source our raw materials locally, we produce and can also buy, mangoes, oranges, pineapples and guava are everywhere in Nigeria, we have the machines, the water.
The only challenges we have is the problem of energy. If we can have constant power here, I can assure you that more staff will be employed because now we are in Kano, Kaduna and Abuja and we intend to increase the number of staff in Kano, and to also go to Lagos, Port Harcourt, and Aba, so more people will be employed, and apart from that, the farmers that we source our raw materials from have the market, so there is value addition.
“Our machine produces 2000 littles per hour so imagine if it were two shifts and if we are working eight hours each what would be the turnover and we can expand. The country will be better off with the support for business of this nature,” he said.
