Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja

The National Food Security Council chaired by President Muhammadu Buhari, which was inaugurated on March 26, has warned that the deadly clashes between farmers and herdsmen could get worse, next year, if efforts are not intensified to create cattle ranches or provide better security against rustling.

A meeting of the  council, which was chaired by Kebbi State Governor, Atiku Bagudu, who is also the vice chairman, also charged the president to quickly approve the establishment and training of agro-rangers, as a special unit, to assist security agencies check clashes between herdsmen and farmers.

Bagudu, presided over the meeting, in the absence of Buhari, who is away to the United Kingdom.

Also at the meeting were governors of Ebonyi, Dave Umahi, Lagos, Akinwunmi Ambode, Delta, Ifeanyi Okowa, and Plateau, Simon Lalong; ministers of Agriculture; Audu Ogbe, Finance; Kemi Adeosun, Trade and Investment; Okechukwu Enelamah, Interior; Abdulrahman Dambazau, Environment and Water Resources; Ibrahim Jibril, Sulieman Adamu, and the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele.

Ogbeh reiterated before State House Correspondents, after the meeting, that government has “to move the cattle to the good old grazing reserves and we just have to create environment for them; clusters of ranches where they have water, grass and security against rustlers.  For nearly 40 years, we didn’t do much about cattle; we also forgot that cattle contribute six percent to GDP.  The cheapest way of rearing cattle is by roaming around with them. If you go into a ranch, it is not cheap and government cannot subsidize cattle-rearing like they do in Europe, where they subsidise every cow with €6 which is about N2,400. We cannot afford that.

“So, the thing is to create those ranches and the herdsmen are prepared to pay tax; to support the programme. If we don’t do it, next year will be worse than this year I assure you.”

On his part, Lalong also disclosed that “part of the recommendations we have made and we are working on, is the issue of agro-rangers.

“And, we noticed that if you are talking about farmers/herdsmen crisis, you have to train a specialised group of security outfit to handle those issues. It is not to concentrate on conventional security.

“So, there is a recommendation before Mr. President; for the employment and training of agro-rangers. What we are still appealing to is for Mr. President to hasten the process so that it can help solve some of the problems that we have in various states on the conflicts between farmers and herdsmen.”

Umahi explained that there were other elements that need to be  addressed in order to bring down high food prices, among others.