tomato farming
Having achieved a mileage in
rice production, the Anchor Borrowers Programme, an initiative of the
Central Bank of Nigeria, is shifting focus on tomato production. The
adventure into tomato production is intended to increase job creation
and ascertain food security in the country, even as capacity of small
scale farmers is enhanced. Bamidele Famoofo reports
The Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP),
an initiative of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), arguably, has
emerged to become the most successful of all government intervention
programmes in
recent times.
CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele,
launched the programme in 2015, being one of the intervention programmes
for sustainable economic growth.
The apex bank had set aside a portion of
the N220billion Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Fund to
finance agricultural projects at a single-digit interest rate of nine
per cent. Chiefly among the aims was to create economic linkages between
over 600,000 smallholder farmers and reputable large-scale processors
with a view to increasing agricultural output and significantly
improving capacity utilisation of integrated mills.
As at 2019, according to the central
bank, over 200,000 smallholder farmers from 29 states of the federation
are already benefitting from the N43.92 billion released directly from
it and 13 other participating financial institutions to fund the
agricultural programme.
President Muhammadu Buhari agreed with
the CBN that the initiative is working as planned. He said 2.5 million
direct jobs had been created through implementation of the programme as
at 2018. Buhari added that about one million more indirect jobs are
believably created also. “A total number of 862,069 farmers cultivating
about 835,239 hectares of land, cultivating 16 different commodities
including rice, wheat, maize, cotton, soya-beans, poultry, cassava and
groundnuts, tomato, in addition to fish farming had already benefited
from the programme.”
On the scorecard of ABP, over seven
million 50kg bags of fertilizer have been produced from 11 blending
plants with a capacity of 2.1 million metric tonnes. “We have saved $150
million in foreign exchange and N60 billion in subsidy. Fertilizer
prices have dropped from N13, 000 per 50kg bag to N5, 500,” Buhari had
disclosed while pointing to some of the achievements of the ABP.
According to the federal government, the
gap between the levels of local rice production and domestic
consumption has been reduced within a space of three years.
Confident that rice production in
Nigeria is getting to a sustainable level, Minister of Agriculture and
Rural Development, Alhaji Sabo Nanono, said the country would begin to
export its brand of rice within the next two years.
Nanono made the revelation during a
working visit of the Nestle Nigeria Plc in Lagos, recently. His words:
“If we maintain the momentum in the next two years, we may export rice
to other countries. I was worried in terms of the production of rice,
but what I have found out is that most rice producers have stocked rice
for the next six months. This means that before the stock is finished,
dry season rice will be harvested, and before that finishes, the rainy
season will come back,” he said.
As at today, according to the minister,
Nigeria can boasts of 11 rice milling plants with the capacity to
produce between 180 tonnes to 350 tonnes of rice per day.
“In a few months, another mill with a
capacity to produce 400 tonnes of rice per day is going to be opened,
with another upcoming 34 smaller mills; then, we have clusters in
different areas,” Nanono added.
And now, another revolution, similar to
what was recorded in the production of rice has started in Nigeria as
the CBN has made good its promise to support massive tomato production
in commercial quantity in the country.
Already, tomato processing plants have
started springing up in parts of the country that would soon make
Nigeria self-sufficient in the commodity.
Very recently, Emefiele said the CBN has mobilised and validated 140,848 tomato farmers for ABP.
The governor made the disclosure at the ground-breaking ceremony of Tomato Jos at Kangimi community in Kaduna recently.
Tomato Jos is an American-owned company
aimed at transforming smallholder farmers from subsistence growers into
commercial producers.
The company has 500 hectares of land
with potential to cultivate tomato of 400 hectares and it is expected to
begin production in 2021.
Emefiele said the beneficial farmers were selected from various Tomato Farmers Associations across 25 states in the country.
He explained that the farmers would be
linked to proximal processors, where applicable, or financed to produce
fresh fruits for direct consumption, which constituted the largest use
of tomato in the country.
“We are also partnering with other big
players in the tomato value chain like Dangote Tomato Processing
Limited, Sonia Foods, GB Foods, Vegefresh Company Limited and a host of
others,” he said.
The main reason why central bank is
focusing on tomato production, according to Emefiele, “is to ensure that
Nigeria becomes self-sufficient in tomato and our processing companies,
functioning at full capacity and employing millions of Nigerian
youths.’’
The Dangote business group is not left
out in the mission of making Nigeria self-sufficient in food production,
especially tomato production.
Recently too, Dangote Tomatoes
Processing Limited, owned by the younger brother of Africa’s richest
man, Sani Dangote, unveiled a N2.8 billion greenhouse nursery in Kano to
supply the best quality tomato seedlings to Nigerian farmers.
Speaking on the project, Sani Dangote
said the nursery was designed to use the automated Pat Moose planting
technology, the first of its kind in Nigeria and has the capacity to
process 350 million tonnes of hybrid tomato seedlings per season
enabling the planting of 12,000 hectares of tomato farm. The pat moose
process takes three weeks before proceeding to the next stage reducing
the whole process of growing tomatoes to just 3 months.
He noted that Nigeria consumes about 2.3
million tonnes of tomatoes annually and with the establishment of the
nursery, “we have created capacity to triple tomato production,
attaining self-sufficiency in tomato production as well as potentially
exporting surplus to neighbouring countries.
According to Dangote, the nursery is
designed to produce the highest quality tomato seedling available
meaning that the farmers can grow the highest yield tomatoes. Currently,
the yields produced by Nigerian farmers are less than the global
standard. As a result, farmers will be able to earn more income from
selling higher volumes of harvests each season.
“Nigeria is on a trajectory to becoming
self-sufficient in rice, tomatoes and poultry production. This means
that millions of jobs will be created for her citizens,” he explained.
Apart from Tomato Jos and Dangote
tomato, another N2 billion tomato processing plant and farm are already
in place in Kaduna State, courtesy the CBN’s agricultural support Anchor
Borrowers’ Programme.
The plant has the capacity to mill 30 tonnes of fresh tomatoes a day.
Director, Corporate Affairs department
of GBfoods, Dr. Teddy Ngu, said the company owns about 100 hectares,
while the farm area is about 30 hectares. About 16 hectares have been
cultivated, while the plan is to plant the entire area. “We plant in
phases so that we can harvest in phases,” he stated, explaining that the
idea is to keep the factory running continuously. “In the long run, we
are going to move to 3,000 hectares,” he added.
The ban on 44 items from accessing forex
from official windows, and deliberate standardisation of agricultural
products in Nigeria largely through the support of the Anchor Borrowers’
scheme has long started making significant impacts on both home and
external fronts. For example, the fourth quarter (Q4 2018) report on
Nigeria’s provisional Balance of Payments (BoP) estimates that was
released a few days ago indicates a significant improvement as the
country recorded a surplus of $2.80 million, compared to the huge
deficit of $4.542 billion recorded the preceding quarter.
It had also recorded a surplus of $6.180
billion in the corresponding period of 2017, according to a “Brief on
Balance of Payments Statistics for Fourth Quarter 2018,” released by the
central bank. A balance of payments surplus meant that Nigeria exported
more than it imported during the period under review. What that means
is that Nigeria is up again to play its role in global trade.
The African continent imports $40
billion of food annually despite having 65 per cent of the world’s
arable land. The public-private model on-going in Nigeria could be
adopted by other African countries to also attain self-sufficiency in
food production.
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