| Nigeria imports 2m tons of
rice yearly – USAID
From LAMBERT TYEM, Abuja
Monday, November 30, 2009
Over two million metric tons of rice is said to be imported annually
into the Nigerian market, out of five million tons of the products
consumed in the country.
United States Agriculture International Development [USAID] Markets
Country Managing Director, Tim Prewitt disclosed this at a round
table talk with journalists in Abuja over the weekend.
USAID Markets Director lamented the non-utilization of huge agricultural
potentials in the country which he said if properly harnessed and
utilized especially in rice production will help check the menace
of rice importation into the country.
He noted also that if Nigeria taps properly its agric business in
rice production, it will be a world supplier of the products and
not consumer as currently witnessed.
Dr. Prewitt however said USAID Markets’ intervention programme
in agric business in Nigeria is informed by the discovery of huge
agricultural endowment in the country, adding that the sector is
gradually setting a new dawn that will soon restore the nations’
lost glory in the industry.
According to USAID: “The intervention initiative is setting
a new trend that is beginning to make Nigerian farmers see farming
not only as a way of life, but as a viable commercial enterprise”.
The MD further lamented the way a rice processing plant in Aba,
Abia State, is being underutilized, which he saidis the best and
largest plant for the processing ion of rice and sorghum in the
world but is not put into maximum use.
He said the plant has a capacity to process about 60,000 tons of
rice at a time but that only half of the figure is processed in
a year at the moment due to low level of rice production in the
country.
Prewitt however called on Nigerian government to step-up efforts
toward ensuring a quick return to agric business in the country
as well as showing the sector a way of diversifying its economic
base.
.
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