Stakeholders to address over 50% post-harvest losses in agric sector

Folalumi Alaran

Stakeholders in agriculture are gathering to discuss solutions for the industry’s post-harvest losses, which have been reported to be between 40 and 50 percent.

This was announced on Wednesday by a few of the stakeholders in advance of the upcoming Feed Nigeria Summit in Abuja in 2022.

At a meeting with the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Director General of the Feed Nigeria Summit Secretariat, Richard Mbaram stated that the summit was a chance to find long-term solutions to the enormous losses experienced in the industry.

Mbaram blamed insufficient storage facilities for the threat.

“We are told that we waste or lose between 40 to 50 percent of what is produced particularly as they are perishables, grains are also affected because the actions of microbes and all the fungi bring about the challenges.

“We have a shortfall in production, demands are not being met by the suppliers from the local setting, so we have to import. Now we don’t even have the option of importing because the target exporting countries have to manage their realities and are no longer in a position to export”, he added.

He therefore said that the Feed Nigeria Summit will galvanize stakeholders in the agricultural sector to chart way forward on how to address the challenges of proper food storage.

He said the Feed Nigeria Summit would also focus on how to recalibrate the Nigerian economy using the advantages that the agricultural sector and agribusiness ecosystem provides.

Mbaram said the Summit would engage stakeholders at the Deal Room, which will be in partnership with the USAID Feed The Future.

He said the Deal Room will also have key partners like African Development Bank (AfDB), International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD), the United Kingdom Department for International Trade.

Mbaram explained that the deal room will present opportunities for farmers and other stakeholders in the agricultural sector to exchange ideas and proffer solutions on how to solve some challenges facing the sector.

For The All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN) most beneficiaries of the billions of naira released by the Central Bank of Nigeria under its Anchor Borrowers’ Programme were not Nigerian farmers.

Although the CBN kicked against this claim, AFAN argued that the apex bank was finding it tough to recover the loans because the funds were disbursed to individuals who were not into farming and not captured in the database of the association.

Speaking on the sidelines of the event and its partnership with the forthcoming Feed Nigeria Summit 2022. The National Secretary, AFAN, Yunusa Yabwa, said “The Anchor Borrowers Programme was a laudable programme by this administration, but in every programme of this nature there must be challenges,” he said.

Yabwa added, “Our members have benefitted from the programme, but most people who benefited from the ABP are not Nigerian farmers. I must confess that to you.

“That is why you see today that the CBN, NIRSAL, commercial banks, who were the channels for the distribution of this fund, are complaining that these beneficiaries are not repaying the loans.”

He said most persons who got the loans could not be accounted for by AFAN, stressing that the association had asked CBN to provide the names of the debtors but the apex bank had not been able to comply.