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Agriculture: The Panacea to Poverty By From Baba Kabiru Isa
Penultimate Sunday while watching a weekly television programme, “Inside Out” anchored by Agartha Amata, I was piqued, definitely, like most other viewers when she narrated the story about a woman, a mother of nine, whose children, are all engaged in one form of menial job or street hawking for the family to survive. That was quite bad but the sordid and pathetic situation of this very family was that they have to soak gari in a bowl of water and leave it for some time for it to swell before they all encircle the bowl to devour the gari probably as supper.
These very family lives in a ramshackle and rusty corrugated iron make shift structure located in slum somewhere in Lagos. To some people, the above story is just a tip on the iceberg. As the family in question can earn some income to afford gari with roof over their heads irrespective of the evils associated with child labour and dehumanized living conditions to which this families are exposed.
Poverty manifests in several ways ranging from malnutrition, diseases, low rate of life expectancy, child labour, dehumanized working conditions, illiteracy, inadequate and inhabitable shelter, low intelligent quotient and high crime rate. Hence an economy plagued with the above negative indices as obtained in Nigeria can hardly make an appreciable growth not to talk of development over time.
Therefore, the issue of poverty is the major challenge facing Nigeria which according to the National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) document ‘remain daunting’ .While the National Poverty Eradication Programme, (NAPEP) posited that poverty is making more people to experience pronounced deprivation. And that, if not quickly addressed, it can “create a divide that can undermine our confidence.”
Nigeria is blessed with enormous human and natural resources no doubt, yet well over two-third of her 130 million inhabitants are wallowing in abject poverty. And if the present trends continue, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) target of 2015 will be a mirage and mere wishful thinking.
We really need to ponder why has the poverty level been on the increase over the years despite the enormous resources and accrued revenue earned by the country all these while? Recalling that in 1980, an estimated 27 per cent of the citizenry lived in poverty. And about two decades later, at least 70 per cent of the ever increasing population wallows in abject poverty at various dimensions. By 1999 more than two-third of Nigerians had income less than US$1.00 per day and the indices are rising by the day.
Life expectancy mortality rose to 77 out of every one thousand and 700 per hundred thousand respectively due to inadequate or non functional basic health and social infrastructures. The country’s growth has been stunted with ever growing arm of poor and unemployed people, largely to due dismally low capacity utilization in the industrial sectors of the economy.
Though the past governments in Nigeria cannot be said to be oblivious of the level of poverty in our midst as some programmes were initiated to better the lots of the citizenry. Such palliative programmes or initiatives include the moribund Operation Feed the Nation (OFN), Green Revolution, River Basic Development Authority(RBDA), Director of Foods, Roads and Rural Infrastructure(DFRRI), NALDA, 1991 Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme and Peoples Bank Nigeria(PBN) Agricultural Insurance Company, Family Economic Advancement Programme (FEAP), Nigeria Agricultural and Corporative Bank(NACB) now Nigeria Agricultural Cooperative and Rural Development Bank being an off shoot of PBN, FEAP and NACB all designed to reposition agriculture to its primus place by opening up the rural areas through the provision of infrastructures and credit or loan able funds.
Unfortunately none of these “lofty” programmes could survive the intricacies of corruption and bureaucracy red-tapism inherent in both the public and private lifes and as such couldn’t make any meaningful impact on the lives of the rural dwellers and by implication the poverty. Well, it is often posited that we have had well conceived ideas and plans in the past but the boat is always rocked at the point of implementation. All the National Development plans were never spared from these vagaries and inept.
However, this is not the time for lamentations and teeth gnashing. Conscious and pragmatic initiatives should be adopted now, to address the problems of poverty and other related dehumanizing conditions pervading our land. The issue of poverty has assumed the position of front burner as a political tool, transcending socio-economic realm. Poverty and its attendant repercussions are now threat to global peace and wellbeing.
The super powers and great economies of this world are loosing sleep knowing well that they can no longer prosper amidst deprivation and hunger ravaged citizens of this world. The “super rich” among the developed countries have initiated several programmes either in the name of donor agencies, bilateral and multilateral cooperatoration or in recent years; debt relief or forgiveness is now being flaunted as political or diplomatic tools.
This act of “benevolence” is to assist poor countries that lack the ability or capacity to pay such debts get off the shackles of debt burden and by implication to enable such poor countries to concentrate on tackling poverty. The recent report of the Unites Nation Development Programme (UNDP) on Human Development Index (HDI), indicates that average life expectancy in Nigeria has dropped from 51.6 to 43.4 years just as the Country was ranked 158th out of 177th in term of poverty. Again, this is not the time to start questioning the genuiness or otherwise of the debt which has become so burdensome and statistics relating to Nigeria over the years.
Hence, at this juncture, our quest should be solutions to this greatest enemy of human race. And it is quite obvious that the immediate and sustainable panacea to poverty can be found in agriculture. It is widely believed that more than 60 per cent of the population of Nigeria live and practice agriculture in the rural areas. For now there are no two ways about it that the most pragmatic way of addressing poverty and its attendant consequences is through agriculture.
No doubt, that it is in recognition of pivot role of agriculture in quest for good life and wealth creation that Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) stipulated that countries, especially the developing ones should allocate 25 percent of their annual budget to agriculture. Unfortunately, what the Nigeria government has been allocating to agriculture was dismal.
Available statistics indicate that the percentage of allocation for agriculture in term capital expenditure has been a far cry from the FAO recommended 25 per cent. The highest allocation so far was 12 per cent recorded in 2004 while the lowest allocation recorded between years 2000 and now were 3.6 per cent and 3.5 per cent for 2000 and 2003 respectively. Other supportive sectors like education, health and even water resources were equally not spared of problem of under funding. And the earlier we review our priorities the better for the nation.
For the fact that over 60 per cent of Nigeria’s population reside in the rural areas practising agriculture predominantly, if this large segment is reasonably catered for, by way of creating enabling environment for agriculture and related activities to thrive, the poverty question and its attendant malaise would have been tackled frontally. The government of the day is already working on the right track through the enhancement of the budgetary allocation to this all important sector.
Going by the recent programme of actions of the National Poverty Eradicated Programme (NAPEP), efforts are now being redirected its activities focus towards partnerships and collaborations with other agencies and groups to source and allocate resources for productive engagements in the economy. To this end, it is being strongly suggested that considerable resources should be channeled to rural based activities because a robust rural economy is capable of kick starting and driving the economy to prosperity.
It is regrettable that agriculture is presently plagued with several problems which includes but not limited to inadequate inputs supply, inadequate working capital, crude or rudimentary tools due to low rata of adoption of technology and poor post harvest technology.Also,the problems pests like locus and quill a birds, environmental hazards like drought ,erosion and pollution and land acquisition are causing set back to agricultural practice as such government would be doing a good job if functional logistics to curtail these retrogressive impediments.
As the NEEDS document being the adopted working guide of the present administration, already enunciated the primus role of agriculture as “main stay of Nigeria’s economy” being the highest contributor to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), largest non-oil export earner, largest employer of labour and a key contributor to wealth creation and potential poverty alleviator, as a large percentage of the population derives its income from agriculture and related activities all hands must be on the deck to revive the sector.
Further to that, the NEEDS programme is aiming at developing agriculture to the level of achieving food security provision of raw-materials and reduction of poverty by enhancing agri-business. Already there are “presidential initiative” in the development and production of certain cash crops like cassava, rice and even livestock among others. Yet, as lofty as those initiatives, without adequate and functional infrastructure, the initiatives may wither away like previous initiatives and programmes.
As such, it is being strongly suggested that governments at various levels should collaborate to “open up” the rural areas through the provision of feeder roads, portable water, electricity and recreational facilities. In short, a modern farm settlement is desirable more than ever before.
Further to that, our research institutes and extension services should be rehabilitated to provide necessary support and encourage innovations among practicing farmers. Fundamentally, access to arable land and micro credits are vital for proper repositioning of wretched peasants on a good stead to cultivate and rear livestock to the level of sustainability and profitability.
The government, especially at state level should engage in land preparation and allocating same to farmers in addition tot eh provision of subsidized inputs like fertilizer, agro chemicals and modern implements while the local government should be able to take care of extension services and coordination of cooperative groups.
On the part of the federal government, capital intensive projects like irrigation dams, and functional micro credit policy to address problems associated drought and lack of funds to procure essential inputs. Institutions like NACRB, Nigeria Agricultural Insurance Company and Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme should be recapitalized and made to function effectively. Suffice to submit that profitable agri-business would create avenue for both backward and forward integration whereby employment opportunities and wealth are created.
On the social side, the problems of rural-urban immigration are going to be reversed as people may now stay back in the rural areas to partake in the agricultural revolution. Even those people who are already stranded in the over populated urban centre would find “village” life more attractive and rewarding. If we achieve this then we would be on the verge of bidding poverty farewell in Nigeria.
I say amen to that.
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