THE IMPERATIVE OF A NATIONAL AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATION ACTION PLAN (ATAP) - The National Association of Nigerian Traders NANTS

The National Economic Management Team                                         19^th September 2011
C/o the Coordinating Minister

Honourable Minister of Finance

Finance House

Central Business District
Abuja
Attention: The Coordinating Minister,

Dear Honourable Minister,
THE IMPERATIVE OF A NATIONAL AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATION ACTION PLAN (ATAP)

We are aware that the National Economic Management Team (EMT) recently unveiled an Agricultural Transformation Action Plan (ATAP) as a key strategy for the implementation of President Goodluck Jonathan’s transformation Agenda for Nigeria. The National Association of Nigerian Traders (NANTS) is indeed delighted with this cheering news – that the ATAP is finally providing the mechanism for revisiting the nation’s abandoned and dysfunctional agricultural sector and giving it a new lease of life.

2. As a matter of fact, since the present administration of His Excellency, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, pronounced its transformation agenda for the Nigerian economy, NANTS has waited with eager expectation for a concrete and documented action plan. WE therefore commend the Economic Management Team for at last providing an insight and particularly for boldly identifying and embracing the agricultural sector as the focal point to lead in the battle against poverty. Accordingly, WE therefore call on the EMT and specifically, the Federal Ministry of Agriculture to urgently consider: (i) formulating the contents of the ATAP as an instrument using a multi-stakeholder approach, and (ii) releasing the framework to the wider public in order to enable Nigerian  stakeholders especially the private sector prepare actions and programmes that would compliment government’s plan in revolutionalizing the sector and kick-start the overall economy.

3. We wish to note, Honourable Minister that over the years, unemployment in Nigeria has multiplied in most devastating proportions and defied several efforts by government’s schemes and initiatives to subdue it. The failure of these schemes which ought to have generated jobs with the capacity of additionally boosting the nation’s GDP can be largely and appropriately attributed to their focus on setting-up/establishing Commissions and Agencies in lieu of reviving the agricultural and manufacturing sectors. The result is that the original intendment and objectives are stifled with bogus and spurious administrative outfits and emoluments that dry up resources meant for the development of the country and poverty reduction. For this reason therefore, the 3.5 million jobs which is intended to be created within four years of implementing the ATAP, is not only a welcome relief to millions of Nigerian restive youths, but also has the potential of becoming the most successful of all extant government initiatives for combating hunger and unemployment.

4. While appreciating the focus on 3.5 million job creation, NANTS would however wish to recall that this is not the first time Nigerians have heard from high level government officials of plans and commitment to numbers of intended jobs in the pipeline. The difference however is that the pronouncement is coming from an assembled set of credible technocrats among others who we believe has the capacity and the will to make good their plans and pronouncements. Nonetheless, WE caution and implore the government to eschew the kind of administrative/white-collar jobs created by the setting up of Commissions and bureaucratic offices, but to target strictly on employment generation that transform the youths into creative, independent entrepreneurs and employers labour.

5. WE must further commend and support the EMT’s vision on the niche crops selected for intervention by the action plan. Indeed, rice, cassava, sorghum, cocoa and cotton are focal crops for the nation. These crops have proven to have very great potentials for wealth creation and generation of immense revenue for the government (if well exploited) especially in view of their value chain capacity. Rice, for instance, is arguably one of the most important staple foods in Nigeria is cultivated in virtually all the agro-ecological zones in the country. Yet, Nigeria spends millions of Dollar importing about 2.5-3 million MT (reportedly spending up to N360bn annually) out of the annual requirement of above 5 million MT with per-capita consumption levels growing significantly at 7.3 percent or more than 47 kg per capita per annum. This sad situation is a clear indication of lip-service to food security all this while, and a further sign of dead attention given to youth employment particularly regarding a commodity that can feed not only the nation but West Africa as a whole. Permit us to state that it is also a shame that Nigeria is seen at this age importing rice which is sometimes reported to have been stored in their originating countries for up to 10 to13 years, only to be consumed by Nigerians.

6. Honourable Minister and members of the EMT, NANTS wants to believe that with the advent of ATAP, Nigeria seems set to retrace its steps to job creation. As a trade and agriculture organisation, NANTS expects that the new programme would take agriculture as a serious business beyond what we see today as ‘survival-vocation’, and that this would therefore translate into government taking her hands off the ‘political business’ of fertilizer, and work towards ultimately achieving her pronouncement of “increasing the number of farmers with access to fertilizer from 11% to 95%”, and this in a purely measurable dimension. This is because the story of ‘subsidized’ fertiliser distribution has remained one that has left a rather bitter taste in the memory of farmers.

7. NANTS wishes to further implore government to take a deeper look into the crises of agro-processing in Nigeria. It is worthy of note that the reason why Nigeria exhausted as huge as about N1.8trn as on food importation recently reported, is expressly owing to the dearth of processing industries for agriculture produce within the country. We are convinced that more than 70% of these imports are processed food which could have been carried out locally without requiring rocket science. We totally condemn the status of Nigeria remaining at the level of mere production without value addition – the same unfortunate condition that has trailed the nation even in the oil sector. Government must therefore invest in and facilitate suitable up-scaling in the appropriate commodity value chains by revitalising processing industries as a precursor to assisting especially the small scale farmers and indeed the entire country escape the poverty trap. Of a truth, we must stem the tide of importation if we are serious with meeting our development strategy and objectives.

8. As an organisation with farmers’ membership, NANTS is particularly interested in and committed to the success of this new ATAP programme and is consequently calling on the EMT to ensure that this initiative does not go the way of its predecessors. To this end therefore, may WE use this opportunity to offer some suggestions on the way forward for the ATAP:

1. Empowerment of Small Scale Farmers: Government should ensure that a substantial percentage of the reported N300 billion to be injected into the programme, reaches the small scale farmers, who are the architects of about 90% of the total food production in the country today.

1. “Portfolio Farmers”: These “farmers” who can be best described as ‘agric Contractors without farmlands’ have sabotaged the country’s agric schemes for so long. WE therefore call on the government to carry out careful investigations on the beneficiaries of previous schemes so as to ensure that the real farmers benefit from the programme.

• Credit and Farm Inputs: NANTS appeals to the designated Authority to kindly ensure that the farmers, especially small scale farmers, receive credit, at affordable interest rates, and farm inputs.

1. Promotion of Organic Farming: As much as the plans for better access to fertilizer is laudable, NANTS proposes that more attention be focused on organic farming, which is eco-friendly, more economical and will not contribute to negative climate change consequences.

1. A Gender Approach to Policy Design and Decision Making Process: The ATAP and other agric policies should take the huge number of women involved in Agriculture as well as youths, into consideration, in order to come up with projects that would attend the specific needs of these groups and other vulnerable ones.

1. Access to Land: Since land is the primary resource in Agriculture, it is expedient that the government takes another look at the extant Land Use Act, in order to bring about equity on access to land by the poor and vulnerable farmers.

• Land Grabbing: Flowing from the foregoing, WE call on the government to as a matter of urgency look into the new trend of the menace of land grabbing in Nigeria, where state governments practically hand over community lands to foreigners, thereby jeopardizing the livelihoods of thousands of Nigerians, and contributing immensely to poverty and unemployment. For the avoidance of doubt, this ugly trend is inimical to food security and the objectives of ATAP. WE wish to emphasize that neither the provisions of the extant Land Use Act nor any other relevant law in Nigeria in any form envisages or permits such quantum of extravagance on acquisition of people’s land which is an essential ingredient for food security.

• Proper Coordination of Agric Related Funding: ATAP should look at harmonizing all the already existing agric programmes and agric related funding windows in Nigeria. This is essential for proper channeling and effective monitoring of impacts of the divers funds. Such harmonization would also learn from the failures of already existing initiatives, and prevent unnecessary duplication (multiplication) of efforts.

1. Monitoring and Evaluation: For ATAP to avoid a place in that graveyard of previous policies and initiatives, the EMT has to ensure strict monitoring and evaluation of implementation of programmes, and this must be done through active involvement of farmer organisations and civil society organisations, reclining on the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

1. Ownership and Sustainability: Commendably, the EMT already specified that they are going to adopt a bottom-up approach for the ATAP, and WE hail that decision. This is because involving all the stakeholders in both the public and private sector will go a long way to guarantee that this programme enjoys popular participation and ownership, which in-turn will translate to results and sustainability.

In conclusion, NANTS reiterates her pledge to the unalloyed support of our more than 1900 farmer members as well as teeming number of trader members, to this worthy initiative of the Economic Management team, and we stand beside the Nigerian government in partnership, to do all within our ambit to ensure its success.

For: NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIAN TRADERS – NANTS

Ken UKAOHA, Esq.

Cc:      1.The Honourable Minister of Agriculture

2. The Honourable Minister of Finance
3. The Honourable Minister of Trade and Investment
4. The MEDIA