June 28, (THEWILL) – The Akwa Ibom State Government has said it has disbursed more than N1.2 billion as interest-free loans to 2,000 cassava farmers in the last two years to curb the monopoly of market unions in the pricing of foodstuffs in the state.
A study by THEWILL reveals that the government’s drive towards food sufficiency is hampered by the low capacity utilisation of its multi-faceted cassava processing mills and lack of commitment from beneficiaries of government agricultural loans.
State Commissioner for Agriculture, Dr. Glory Edet, said the loan scheme was a deliberate move to tame the astronomical price of garri, by boosting the production capacity of cassava farmers.
Edet pointed out that the initiative was not limited to increased cassava production, disclosing that 2,000 maize and vegetable farmers also benefitted from interest-free loans, even as her ministry distributed 700,000 cocoa seedlings to cocoa farmers and boosted livestock farmers with improved breeds of goats and other animals.
She explained that the present utilisation of the cassava mills is dependent on the quantity of cassava from its demonstration farms across the state but said that government had in addition acted as off-takers by buying from small holder cassava farmers to increase processing capacity and empower the farmers to sustain production.
According to her, the ministry has sustained the sale of more than 150 bags of 120kg bags of garri daily at a reduced price in different parts of the state to ameliorate the hardship on residents and force the stabilization of the price of the commodity in the open market
She said: “Akwa Ibom is blessed with a good soil and in Governor Udom Emmanuel we have a Governor known for his passion for agriculture by making it key in his eight-point agenda and he believes that through agriculture we can reduce poverty, feed well and stabilize the economy.
“In the area of cultivation, we have been encouraging farmers with Interest Free Loans. Last year we gave over 2,000 farmers N250,000 for each of the over 5,000 hectares they cultivated. We also gave them free improved varieties of cassava stem and this has boosted production in the state.
“We also established Cassava Processing Mills across the state so we can cultivate and process. We are also selling Garri at subsidized rates to help break the monopoly of the unions because we discovered that the unions were charging traders between N300,000 and N500,000 to be admitted and because of that they increased the price of the commodity they sell in order to recover their money.
“So we invited the unions from the various markets in the state and stopped them from making it compulsory for people to join their union with that kind of money because if you don’t keep the market open, some people may just have a basin or a bag to sell and you can’t come and tell such people to pay N500,000.
“We have also told them that they can’t reduce the number of sellers in the market because we found out that they created artificial scarcity because for instance in a market of 1,000 sellers they will tell say 50 to sell on Monday, maybe 150 on Tuesday and so on. So we have stopped that and now sellers are free to go and sell without restriction.
“To break the monopoly too we have harvested the cassava we planted in our demonstration farms. We have also processed them and selling them at three cups for N100 when it was a cup for N100 in the open market and we ensured we take them to major markets around the state like Akpanandem, Itam, the market in Eket, Abak and planning to go to Oron in addition to selling at the State Secretariat three times a week.”
But the broader initiative, according to the Commissioner, has been on increasing the scope of the state government’s Green House with increased emphasis on the training and empowerment of individual holder farmers with funds, equipment, agro chemicals, fertilizer and improved varieties of seeds and stems.
The ministry, she said, has also expanded its swampy rice production capacity to include individual holder farms in Okobo, Uruan, Ibiono Ibom and Nsit Ubium LGAs, in addition to existing plantations at Ini Local Council.
Edet further stated that with a processing capacity of 900,000 coconuts per day at the state Coconut Processing Factory, the Ministry has stepped up training and enlightenment for individual and school holder coconut plantations across the state.
She maintained that the efforts were a holistic strategy to ensure that the state government’s target of local production of at least 80 percent of food consumed in the state by 2023 is achieved.
But correspondents, who visited some of the cassava mills, however discovered that the facilities were underutilized even as only a small percentage of the populace benefitted from the government’s subsidized sales as many who could not access the sales points either by reasons of location or inadequate information and had to continue to buy at exorbitant prices.
Although observers felt that the mills had the capacity to produce enough for the populace at a reduced price, it was discovered that apart from few individual farmers and cooperatives who patronize the mills, government’s efforts to mass produce the commodity have largely remained inadequate.
For instance, it was gathered that the mills have capacity to produce more than 350 bags a week, but their current weekly production has not been more than 50 bags even as the commodity sometimes is not readily available for consumers to purchase at the State Secretariat.
Many residents are of the opinion that the government procured much of the commodity for sale from neighbouring states, wondering how the food sufficiency drive would succeed.
It would be recalled that the State Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Ini Ememobong, had said that the sudden increase in the price of garri was not borne out of insufficiency, but, “caused by a decision by the association of garri sellers who did not only unilaterally increase the price of garri, but rationed the product to create a state of scarcity.
“As a government we did not fold our arms, we opened our warehouses and sold garri at reduced prices. This intervention has helped to reduce the effect of the price increase on the people.”
