Christian Council of Nigeria(CCN), on Thursday lamented over the reports that 2.5 million Nigerian children are suffering from acute malnutrition, saying such development is unacceptable since the country is not in a war situation.
The group, which was deeply involved in food security advocacy , urged the federal and state governments to devise strong agriculture templates that would boost food production in the country and bail the citizens out of hunger.
The CCN spoke when its delegation paid a ‘Food Security’ advocacy visit on Governor Ayodele Fayose in Ado Ekiti.
A text signed by CCN’s General Secretary, Yusuf Wushishi and National Coordinator, Ecumenical Food Security and Peace Building Programme, Mrs Celine Osukwu and addressed to the governor, said poverty is gradually taking toll on every family and that only food production could bail the victims out of the quagmire..
The text presented by Rev. Olu Ajayi added that time has come for Nigerians to be fully involved in food production so that its much touted advocacy that ‘Nigerians should eat food produced in Nigeria and for Nigerians to grow what the locals can consume’ could be realised.
The body said “it is not a thing of joy and pride to any Nigerian to see millions of people going to bed with empty stomach”, noting that Ekiti, being a predominantly agrarian society must establish more farm settlements to employ redundant youths and encourage commercial farming in the state.
“Other areas where government should intervene include subsidization of farm implements , it should look into importation of animal feeds to curtail adulteration, investing in the soil and supporting agro-ecological schemes, transportation of food items to reduce cost , tackling of climate change, monitoring of foreign foods and promotion of farming”.
The Commissioner for Agriculture, Mr Kehinde Odebunmi, who received the delegation on behalf of the governor, said the state government is embarking on what he called ‘Land Banking System’ to make lands available to interested farmers in view of paucity of lands being encountered by commercial farmers. .
Fayose said the government is in partnership with the Bank of Agriculture for the provision of loans to farmers , revealing that it was making efforts to access a sum of N600 million for farmers through the bank and that a staggering sum of N100 million has been released out of the money.
“The state government is serious about farming and we are encouraging the farmers now that nobody knows when the next salary will be paid.
Everyone must be able to grow food to feed himself. We are clearing lands all over the state for onward distribution to intending farmers to grow crops .
“But I can’t say we are not having challenges, there is dearth of farming equipment. As I speak with you, we only have ten tractors in the state and this can’t really address the needs of the farmers, because it is our intention to take farming beyond subsistence level.
“We call on the donor agencies, philanthropic groups and well-meaning Nigerians to fund agriculture in Ekiti. Going into irrigation farming to make food available throughout the year like we have in the North, but this is capital intensive which we can’t shoulder now that we are in recession,” he said.
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