Stakeholders in the agrciulture sector have proffered workable solutions for the attainment of food security as the country attains 62 years of Independence.
They said this in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday in Lagos while reviewing the performance of the Nigerian agriculture sector since independence.
The Director-General of the National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services (NAERLS), Prof Emmanuel Ikani, harped on the need to have qualified personnel with requisite skill and expertise as leaders in the sector.
Ikani said that the country has not lived up to expectations in achieving giant strides in agriculture as it still practices subsistence farming.
“Since 1960, we have been engaged in farming and not agriculture, farming alone cannot ensure food security.
“From 1960 till date we have not been involved in agriculture. Agriculture is about knowledge, it is about skills, expertise and technology.
“Over 80 per cent of mechanisation in the Nigerian agric space is restricted to cutlass and hoes. These items are only found in the museum in developed climes.
“We have not achieved food security and advancement in the sector because we have been paying lip service to agriculture.
“To get the best in the sector we must engage skillful and trained personnel. If we do that we do not need 75 per cent of our adult population to produce food for the country.
“When granting loans and access to financing to farmers, we must look for the real farmers and not political farmers if we are to achieve food security as a nation.
“What is killing the sector is the proliferation of political farmers in the Nigerian agric space.
“ To move agriculture forward we must give the space to the right people and in less than five years Nigeria will feed herself and the whole West Africa,” Ikani said
On his part, Mr Akin Alabi, Co- Founder Corporate Farmers International, also insisted on having the right people leading the sector.
Alabi also called for the involvement of the private sector in all levels of agriculture value-chains and the engagement of the youth to ensure food security.
According to him: “In achieving food security we need to put the right leaders in the agriculture sector. We need those who understand the sector and those with passion at the helms of affairs.
“We need square pegs in square holes. Those who head the sector should actually be those who practice agriculture.
“Leadership is a major critical role in getting it right for food security. We also need the involvement of the private sector to boost the sector.
“We must involve the private sector in all levels from funding, processing, transportation, sales and exports.
“Processing of agro-produce need to be spearheaded by the private sector. The government is just an enabler.
“We need to encourage more youths in the sector, they must get into agriculture as a career and not a hobby. Let us take agriculture beyond farming,” Alabi said.
An aquaculture expert, Mr Bashir Amin, called for a well defined roadmap to help the Nigerian agriculture sector fulfil its potential.
“To achieve food security in Nigeria, we must have a roadmap. All the sections of the sector must have plan for the development of the space.
“So that we know where we are today and what we need to do in the next five years to attain food security.
“We still have high quality and large volume of agro-produce locally but also have a large volume of harvest loss.
“We need to do something about post-harvest losses and storage if we must achieve food security in Nigeria.
“This is very important, not all agro-produce cultivated locally get to the market in good shape. We must minimise food wastage,” Amin added.
Ms Ifeoluwa Oyeyemi, the Chief Executive Officer of Farm Help Agro Stores, an farm inputs company, emphasised the need to practice smart agriculture to attain food security.
“We can get it right in achieving food security and getting it right in the sector by adopting land reforms.
“We have to practice smart agriculture in a way that will bring about great innovation and technology to boost food productivity.
“We must make agric education a priority so that we can get the youth involved extensively in the sector. We should get everyone involved in the sector from cradle.
“Farmers should be able to access technology in terms of provision of basic farm infrastructure to reduce the drudgery associated with agriculture practice in Nigeria.
“As a country, we must push the frontiers of the sector forward by removing all barriers from farmers path. The opening of river dams is also important to reduce our dependence on rain-fed agriculture.
“We should be concentrated with backward integration, producing all our basic food necessity with less reliance on food imports.
“When we see agriculture as a business, then we will move forward and attain food security.
“Access to storage facilities is pertinent in achieving food security. A lot of agro-produce waste due to poor or no value-chain addition.
“We must cut short post-harvest losses if we must achieve food security as a country,” Oyeyemi said.