NANFeatures/Vol.10/No.230/2016 (Sept. 30)
Diversifying Nigeria’s economy via cassava production
A News Analysis by Jacinta Nwachukwu and Ginika Okoye, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Resident Representative in Nigeria Opia Kumah recently noted in a forum that cassava has a huge potential to drive Nigeria’s economy.
According to him, linking cassava cultivation to industrial production will create jobs and improve living standards of the farmers, especially women who are predominant in its cultivation.
He observed further that UNDP recently inaugurated an agriculture initiative known as the Agribusiness Supplier Development Programme (ASDP) to assist Nigeria in the diversification of its economy.
He stressed that the initiative was primarily designed to improve cassava and rice production for small holder farmers to reduce dependence on oil in the country.
Kumah explained that ASDP would promote cassava production which could generate multiplier benefits as well as reduce poverty, especially in the rural communities.
Similarly, the President, Cassava Growers Association, Mr Segun Adewumi, said cassava had the potential to infuse not less than N20 trillion annually into the country’s economy if adequately utilised.
He added that cultivation of cassava, one of the most reliable cash crops in the world, could also stimulate industrial revolution and solve Nigeria’s economy problems.
According to him, making cultivable lands available to cassava farmers will make them improve their yields and create employment.
Adewumi added that cassava cultivation, production and processing could replace oil and generate foreign exchange for the country if fully tapped.
He expressed regret that the country spent more than N600 billion each year to import ethanol and starch which were cassava derivatives that could be processed and sourced locally.
“Cassava has about 20 food types such as tapioca, fufu, garri, cassava bread, cassava cake and cassava flour, among others.
“It also has three major industrial products such as ethanol, starch and cassava flour which are raw materials for other products.
“We have been trying to set up industries that will utilise cassava for the benefit of the country,’’ he said.
He called on government to promote cassava cultivation, saying if cassava was accorded the needed attention, it would rise beyond oil.
“The Federal Government should provide adequate infrastructural facilities for farmers to encourage bumper production of cassava.
“It should encourage setting up industries and mechanisable cassava farms,’’ Adewumi stressed.
The president observed that modern cassava cultivation required mechanisation to meet up with international best practices.
In the same vein, Mr Rajavelu Rajasekar, the Director of Allied Atlantic Distilleries Ltd., an ethanol manufacturing company in Nigeria, said that encouraging local production of ethanol would make the country save its foreign exchange.
He, therefore, appealed to government at all levels to provide suitable land for farmers to enable them cultivate cassava.
“Nigeria is importing 260 million litres of ethanol and we produce nine million litres in a year.
“Thousands of direct and indirect employments on loading, agriculture, transport are the benefits of the local people in the farming area and the factory area.
“We have the ambitious plan of multiplying this mill in different states and we are working towards another three to four mills before 2020.
“We want to increase from nine million litres to 75 million litres in another four to five years,’’ Rajasekar said.
Stressing the values of cassava cultivation, Dr Audu Grema, the Senior Programme Officer, Agriculture, West African Office of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, said the foundation was funding a cassava value addition project in Abeokuta to sustain food security in Nigeria.
Grema noted that the foundation would align its programmes with the Federal Government agricultural policy to enable the country to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
Similarly, Chief Audu Ogbeh, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, said the Federal Government had established a cassava bread development fund to encourage farmers.
Ogbeh, who said this at a round-table on cassava value chain recently in Abuja, noted that the government had procured cassava milling machines for the purpose of producing high quality cassava flour in the country.
The minister said the Federal Government was partnering with the African Development Bank (AfDB) to reposition the country’s Staple Crop Processing Zone.
He added that repositioning the zone would encourage and attract both local and international companies to invest in cassava production and processing.
“The Federal Government has inaugurated the new policy regime on agriculture known as the Green Alternative,’’ he said.
According to him, the new policy is out to link the small holder farmers to increase cassava production, create jobs to generate foreign exchange.
Sharing similar sentiments, Mr Babajide Arowosafe, the Executive Director, Technical, Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System in Agricultural Lending, opined that there was the need to refocus Nigeria from major importers of cassava derivatives to major exporters of the products.
He said that the organisation, an arm of the Central Bank of Nigeria that disburses low cost financing to Nigerian agribusinesses, was ready to support the economy using agriculture as a platform.
“Nigeria is the highest producing country of cassava tubers in the world. We need to look at the comparative advantage that we have to add value to the economy,’’ he said.
Nutritionists, nonetheless, observe that cassava crop is not only useful in diversifying the economy but can be used to improve health.
They note that one cup of boiled cassava contains 330 calories, 78 grammes of carbohydrates, three grammes of protein and four grammes each of fibre and sugar.
According to them, being naturally gluten-free, cassava is extremely useful for celiac patients and others trying to avoid gluten.
They also note that cassava is one of several root foods defined by the Philippines’ Department of Science and Technology as a good diet for diabetic patients.(NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the writer as well as News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)