The National Economic Council has recommended a reduction in the cost of fertiliser and other farm inputs, to boost the activities of farmers in Nigeria.
Jigawa State Governor, Umar Namadi, disclosed this to State House Correspondents at the end of Thursday’s meeting of the Council chaired by Vice President Kashim Shetima.
Governor Namadi said priority would be given to smallholder farmers in the distribution of farm implements, to boost their capacity.
He said; “I presented to the council a memo regarding the constraints affecting agricultural production and the potential they have in exacerbating the fragile food security system that the Nigerian government has been trying to resolve in the last two years.
“This was the same memo I presented last week at the meeting of the Presidential Food Systems Coordinating Unit steering committee chaired by the Vice President.
“Government should give equal emphasis to optimising fertiliser cost, perhaps through the prioritisation of the mandate given to the PFSCU to liberalise the fertiliser regime.
“Make available smaller handheld implements for small-scale and subsistence farmers who are invariably too low in the ladder to immediately benefit from the tractor programme.”
“The Memo also called on the Chairman of NEC, the Vice President, to respectfully remind the President of his directive during the special NEC meeting held in June 2024, where he ordered NASENI to ramp up production and also seek his approval to fund the production between 50,000 to 100,000 pumps for distribution to the states on a needs basis,” the Govenror explained.
Governor Namadi said the Council resolved to frontally tackle the challenges of high energy cost and fertiliser prices in the country.
“The Council also directed the Minister of State for Petroleum (Gas) to interface with stakeholders in the industry with the view to addressing high cost and availability of gas domestically and report back at the next meeting of Council,” he stated.